shes, a tub of salt pork,
a rifle, a teapot, a sack of meal, sundry small provisions and a violin,
in a double wagon drawn by oxen. . . . A young black shepherd dog with
tawny points and the name of Sambo followed the wagon or explored the
fields and woods it passed.

The boy Josiah--familiarly called Joe--sits beside his mother. He is a
slender, sweet-faced boy. He is looking up wistfully at his mother. The
little girl Betsey sits between him and her father.

That evening they stopped at the house of an old friend some miles up
the dusty road to the north.

"Here we are--goin' west," Samson shouted to the man at the doorstep.

He alighted and helped his family out of the wagon.

"You go right in--I'll take care o' the oxen," said the man.

Samson started for the house with the girl under one arm and the boy
under the other. A pleasant-faced woman greeted them with a hearty
welcome at the door.

"You poor man! Come right in," she said.

"Poor! I'm the richest man in the world," said he. "Look at the gold on
that girl's head--curly, fine gold, too--the best there is. She's
Betsey--my little toy woman--half past seven years old--blue eyes--helps
her mother get tired every day. Here's my toy man Josiah--yes, brown
hair and brown eyes like Sarah--heart o' gold--helps his mother,
too--six times one year old."

"What pretty faces!" said the woman as she stooped and kissed them.

"Yes, ma'am. Got 'em from the fairies," Samson went on. "They have all
kinds o' heads for little folks, an' I guess they color 'em up with the
blood o' roses an' the gold o' buttercups an' the blue o' violets.
Here's this wife o' mine. She's richer'n I am. She owns all of us. We're
her slaves."

"Looks as young as she did the day she was married--nine years ago,"
said the woman.

"Exactly!" Samson exclaimed. "Straight as an arrow and proud! I don't
blame her. She's got enough to make her proud I say. I fall in love
again every time I look into her big brown eyes."

The talk and laughter brought the dog into the house.

"There's Sambo, our camp follower," said Samson. "He likes us, one and
all, but he often feels sorry for us because we cannot feel the joy that
lies in buried bones and the smell of a liberty pole or a gate post."

They had a joyous evening and a restful night with these old friends and
resumed their journey soon after daylight. They ferried across the lake
at Burlington and fared away over the mountains and through th