Presently the family and their guest were seated at the supper table bedecked in all the splendor of the "boughten cloth" and "blue chaney" dishes, and loaded with corn dodgers, roasted potatoes, bacon, hominy, pickled cabbage leaves and honey. Just as the others were taking their places, Henry Rogers entered, and, after bashfully greeting the stranger, took his place at the table. He was a tall, raw-boned, sandy-haired lad of seventeen, with stooping shoulders, slouching figure, big feet and toilworn hands. His large-featured, freckled face was kept from commonplaceness by its frank gray eyes, broad brow, firm chin and refined mouth.

"Try an' mek out yer suppah, suh," Mrs. Rogers urged as she handed Dudley a cup of steaming coffee. "I'm feared thar ain't much fittin' to eat. Ef we'd knowed in time, we might hev killed a shoat."

"Try some o' this middlin'," chimed in Rogers on the other side, passing the dish. "Tilt up the plattah an' git some gravy; it's better'n the meat. Wish 'twuz time fur 'possum. My mouth fa'rly watahs fur a taste o' possum meat. 'Tain't jes' a fashionable dish now, I reckon," he continued, reaching out for a potato; "Susan heah kindah turns up her nose et 'possum, an' I reckon Mar'm Gilcrest would die away et the sight uv 'possum meat on her table, but——"

The mention of Mrs. Gilcrest acted as a challenge to Mrs. Rogers. "Jane Gilcrest's a fine somebody to turn up her nose et 'possum! A purty mess her table'd be, fur all its silver spoons an' fine chaney, ef she hed the settin' uv it.—Tommy, don't spill thet gravy on the tablechoth. I'll send you'n' Buddy to the kitchen ef you can't eat lak white folks!—She puffs herse'f on bein' a Temple, an' claims they wuz uv the bluest blood in Virginny. Frum the way she spouts 'bout her generalgies, her fambly tree must be ez fine an' big ez thet ole elm down thah by the spring-house; but be thet ez it may, she's a pore limb offen any fambly tree, with her sheftless ways.—Rache, fotch in some moah hom'ny.—Gilcrest's got the finest house in these parts, and——"

"Yes," interrupted her husband, "the logs is weathahboa'ded an' the walls plarstahed, an' thah's big porches with pillahs an' lots o' fine fixin's 'roun' the cornish. The weathahboa'din' an' shingles an' door an' windah frames wuz brung frum Pittsburg to Limestone on flatboats, an' wagoned through frum thah. Sam Carr did the wag'nin'! 'Twuz a big undahtakin', but he made money on it."

"The furnicher's ez fine ez the house," went on Mrs. Rogers. "Thar is a boughten cairpit in the parlor, an' mahog'ny sofy an' cheers.—Lucindy, wipe yer knife on yer bread befoh he'pin' yo'se'f to buttah. Can't I nevah l'arn you no mannahs?"

"They have a big music-piece with ivory keys, and Miss Abby's teaching Betsy to play on it," said Susan, forgetting her shyness, and her blue eyes shining at the recollection of this wonder.

"Yes, it's all mighty fine, an' I'm shore I don't begrudge any uv it: an' now thet Miss Abby hez come to live thar an' Betsy's gittin' to be a big gal, things is bettah looked aftah," Mrs. Rogers conceded. "The heft o' manidgment falls on Betsy an' Miss Abby, fur Jane hain't no more faculty then a grasshopper.—Lucy, don't eat with yer fingers lak a niggah. Whut's yer knife fur, ef it ain't to eat with?—I wuz ovah there last spring, 'long in April or May, an' axed Jane ef she'd got her soap grease made up. She looked et me onconsarned lak, an' says she really didn't know; ole Dilsey allus looked aftah sich things. Think on it! a wife an' mothah an' housekeepah not knowin' ef the year's soap grease wuz wucked up—an' it late on in spring, too. Jane she knits some, an' she kin do a lot o' fine herrin'-bonin' an' tattin' an' tambour wuck; but spinnin' an' weavin' an' mekin' candles an' soap, an' sich useful emplements, she don't consarn about no more'n my Lucindy an' Lucy.—Henry, ef you eat any more o' thet bacon, you'll be squealin' lak a pig, befoh mawnin'. Hev some more honey, Mistah Dudley."

After supper was over, the table cleared, and the two little boys stowed away in the trundle-bed, the rest of the family gathered about the broad hearth.

"Heah." Mrs. Rogers said to the twins, "you don't go to the kitchen to play. You fooled 'way so much time out in the orcha'd this evenin' thet yer stent hain't nigh done. Set right down on them stools, an' don't let me heah a word outen you tell them socks is ready to hev the heel sot. Ha'f a finger length more you've both got to knit." She measured the unfinished socks, and then handed each little girl her task. "Henry, you'll put yer eyes out readin' by thet fire, an' me an' Susan needs all the candle-light fur our wuck. 'Pears lak you ain't nevah happy 'less you've got yer nose in some book. Heah, Cissy, them britches' laigs is ready to seam up. Mek yer stitches good an' tight, else you'll haf to rip it all out an' do it ovah. Snuff the candle, fust, an' hand me thet hank o' thread an' the shears, befoh you set down."

"Le's see," said Rogers to his guest, taking a corncob pipe from the mantel and lighting it with a fire coal. "This is Friday, an' school oughtah begin Monday. Bettah draw up a subscription paper to-night, an' ride 'roun' with it airly to-morrow. I'll send Henry 'long to show you the way. Set right down heah by the table an' draw up yer writin's. Henry, light anothah candle." As he spoke, he went to the tall chest of drawers and took out paper, a bottle of pokeberry ink, and a bunch of quills.

"I see you kin mek a pen," he continued, as Dudley took out his knife, selected a quill, and proceeded in a businesslike way to point it. "Now, whut kind uv a fist do you write? Hope you kin mek all the flourishes; ha'f the folks in Bourbon County jedge a man's book l'arnin' by the way he writes. That's hunkey-dorey!" he exclaimed, looking over the writer's shoulder. "Thet'll fetch 'em!"

When the clock pointed to half-past eight, Mrs. Rogers rolled up her work, declaring it time for all honest folks to be abed. "Thar's lots o' wuck to be did to-morrow, an' the only way to git it did, is to tek a good holt on the day at the start, an' set it squarely on its laigs."

CHAPTER II.

GETTING TO WORK

"This process of 'setting the day on its legs' is certainly a noisy one," was Abner's first thought next morning as he awoke in the gray dawn to find that the place beside him in the big feather bed had already been vacated by Henry.

Above the clatter made by dogs, chickens and geese in the yard below, could be heard the stentorian tones of Mason Rogers evoking his black myrmidons. "Hi, thar, Rube, Tom, Dink, Eph! Wake up, you lazy varmints!" From the negro quarters came, in answer to each name, "Yes, suh! Comin', Marstah!" The creaking boards of the back porch, the slamming of doors, the clatter of cooking utensils, and the admonishing voice of Mrs. Rogers attested that she, too, was taking "holt on the day" in earnest.

Dudley slipped into his clothes and hastened down the steep stairway in search of such toilet accessories as his attic apartment did not afford. When he reached the porch, the twins provided him with a basin of water, a "noggin" of lye soap, and a towel; and telling him he would find the "coarse comb on the chist of drawers in the settin'-room," hurried to the poultry-yard, where the chickens were already off their roosts and clamoring for their morning meal.

His toilet completed, Dudley started for a ramble before breakfast. At first a faint pink light began to tinge the eastern sky, but presently, from over the crest of the hills across the road, the sun arose like a red ball, dispersing the chill gray mist, and the new day, fresh and radiant and vibrant with the songs of birds, the crowing and cackling of chickens, and the lowing of cattle, was fully inaugurated.

If the stranger found the scene in front of the house quietly beautiful, no less interesting was the more homely one to the rear. In the stable lot Susan and Rache were each stooping beside a