y gathered in volume as it went from mouth
to mouth until it crystallized as a crime in the minds of half a dozen
of our toughest citizens--boys who hankered for excitement as a hungry
stomach hankers for food. He was finally rounded up in a field adjoining
the Mill Row meeting-house and pelted with stones. I was of the
"gallery" that watched the fun. I watched until a track of blood
streaked down Hughie's pock-marked face. Then I ran home and told Anna.

"Ma!" I yelled breathlessly, "they're killin' Hughie Thornton!"

Jamie threw his work down and accompanied Anna over the little garden
patches to the wall that protected the field. Through the gap they went
and found poor Hughie in bad shape. He was crying and he cried like a
brass band. His head and face had been cut in several places and his
face and clothes were red.

They brought him home. A crowd followed and filled Pogue's entry, a
crowd that was about equally divided in sentiment against Hughie and
against the toughs.

I borrowed a can of water from Mrs. McGrath and another from the Gainers
and Anna washed old Hughie's wounds in Jamie's tub. It was a great
operation. Hughie of course refused to divest himself of any clothing,
and as she said afterwards it was like "dhressin' th' woonds of a
haystack."

One of my older brothers came home and cleared the entry, and we sat
down to our stir-about and buttermilk. An extra cup of good hot strong
tea was the finishing touch to the Samaritan act. Jamie had scant
sympathy with the beggar-man. He had always called him hard names in
language not lawful to utter, and even in this critical exigency was not
over tender. Anna saw a human need and tried to supply it.

"Did ye blink th' cow?" Jamie asked as we sat around the candle after
supper.

"Divil a blink," said Hughie.

"What did th' raise a hue-an'-cry fur?" was the next question.

"I was fixin' m' galluses, over Crawford's hedge, whin a gomeral luked
over an' says, says he:

"'Morra, Hughie!'

"'Morra, bhoy!' says I.

"'Luks like snow,' says he (it was in July).

"'Aye,' says I, 'we're goin' t' haave more weather; th' sky's in a bad
art'" (direction).

Anna arose, put her little Sunday shawl around her shoulders, tightened
the strings of her cap under her chin and went out. We gasped with
astonishment! What on earth could she be going out for? She never went
out at night. Everybody came to her. There was something so mysterious
in that sudden exit tha