the war, I reckon," said Amos,
from the kerosene barrel.

"Hold on, Amos," put in the Judge warningly, "that's outlawed. Talking
about being bald and the war reminds me of the night Walters and I----
By the way, where is Walters to-night?"

"Sick," put in the Colonel, straightening up exultantly. "I waxed him
three straight games last night. You won't see him again till spring.
Skunked him once, and beat him twice."

"Oh, git out."

"Hear the old seed twitter!"

"Did you ever notice, gentlemen, how lying and baldness go together?"
queried Foster, reflectively.

"No! Do they?"

"Invariably. I've known many colossal liars, and they were all as bald
as apples."

The Colonel was getting nervous, and was so slow that even Gordon (who
could sit and stare at the board a full half hour without moving) began
to be impatient.

"Come, Colonel, marshal your forces a little more promptly. If you're
going at me _echelon_, sound y'r bugle; I'm ready."

"Don't worry," answered the Colonel, in his calmest nasal. "I'll
accommodate you with all the fight you want."

"Did it ever occur to you," began the Judge again, addressing the crowd
generally, as he moved back to the stove and lit another cigar, "did it
ever occur to you that it is a little singular a man should get bald on
the _top_ of his head first? Curious fact. So accustomed to it we no
longer wonder at it. Now see the Colonel there. Quite a growth of hair
on his clapboarding, as it were, but devilish thin on his roof."

Here the Colonel looked up and tried to say something, but the Judge
went on imperturbably:

"Now, I take it that it's strictly providential that a man gets bald on
top of his head first, because, if he _must_ get bald, it is best to get
bald where it can be covered up."

"By jinks, that's a fact!" said Foster, in high admiration of the
Judge's ratiocination. Steve was specially pleased, and, drawing a
neck-yoke from a barrel standing near, pounded the floor vigorously.

"Talking about being bald," put in Foster, "reminds me of a scheme of
mine, which is to send no one out to fight Indians but bald men. Think
how powerless they'd be in"----

The talk now drifted off to Indians, politics and religion, edged round
to the war, when the grave Judge began telling Ridings and Robie just
how "Kilpatrick charged along the Granny White Turnpike," and, on a
sheet of wrapping-paper, was showing where Major John Dilrigg fell. "I
was on his left, about t