nkempt
freedom of the mountain fastnesses in which I had lately lived and
moved. Yuba Bill, the driver, whose usual expression of humorous
discontent deepened into scorn as he gathered up his reins as if to
charge the village and recklessly sweep it from his path, indicated a
huge, rambling, obtrusively glazed, and capital-lettered building with
a contemptuous flick of his whip as we passed. "Ef you're kalkilatin'
we'll get our partin' drink there you're mistaken. That's wot they call
a TEMPERANCE HOUSE--wot means a place where the licker ye get underhand
is only a trifle worse than the hash ye get above-board. I suppose
it's part o' one o' the mysteries o' Providence that wharever you find
a dusty hole like this--that's naturally THIRSTY--ye run agin a
'temperance' house. But never YOU mind! I shouldn't wonder if thar
was a demijohn o' whiskey in the closet of your back office, kept thar
by the feller you're relievin'--who was a white man and knew the ropes."

A few minutes later, when my brief installation was over, we DID find
the demijohn in the place indicated. As Yuba Bill wiped his mouth with
the back of his heavy buckskin glove, he turned to me not unkindly. "I
don't like to set ye agin Gile-ad, which is a scrip-too-rural place,
and a God-fearin' place, and a nice dry place, and a place ez I've
heard tell whar they grow beans and pertatoes and garden sass; but
afore three weeks is over, old pard, you'll be howlin' to get back on
that box seat with me, whar you uster sit, and be ready to take your
chances agin, like a little man, to get drilled through with buckshot
from road agents. You hear me! I'll give you three weeks, sonny, just
three weeks, to get your butes full o' hayseed and straws in yer har;
and I'll find ye wadin' the North Fork at high water to get out o'
this." He shook my hand with grim tenderness, removing his glove--a
rare favor--to give me the pressure of his large, soft, protecting
palm, and strode away. The next moment he was shaking the white dust
of Gilead from his scornful chariot-wheels.

In the hope of familiarizing myself with the local interests of the
community, I took up a copy of the "Gilead Guardian" which lay on my
desk, forgetting for the moment the usual custom of the country press
to displace local news for long editorials on foreign subjects and
national politics. I found, to my disappointment, that the "Guardian"
exhibited more than the usual dearth of domestic i