Abraham put one foot out of bed. Samuel took hold of his arm and with
this assistance the old man managed to get up entirely and stand, though
shaking as if with the palsy, upon the floor.

"Feel pooty good, don't yew?" demanded Samuel, but with less severity.

"A leetle soft, a leetle soft," muttered the other. "Gimme my cane.
Thar, ef one o' them women comes in the door I'll--I'll--" Abraham
raised his stick and shook it at the innocent air. "Whar's my pipe? Mis'
Homan, she went an' hid it last week."

After some searching, Samuel found the pipe in Abe's hat-box underneath
the old man's beaver, and produced from his own pocket a package of
tobacco, whereupon the two sat down for a quiet smoke, Samuel chuckling
to himself every now and again, Abe modestly seeking from time to time
to cover his bare legs with the skirt of his pink-striped night-robe,
not daring to reach for a blanket lest Samuel should call him names
again. With the very first puff of his pipe, the light had come back
into the invalid's eyes; with the second, the ashen hue completely left
his cheek; and when he had pulled the tenth time on the pipe, Abe was
ready to laugh at the sisters, the whole world, and even himself.

"Hy-guy, but it's splendid to feel like a man ag'in!"

The witch of Hawthorne's story never gazed more fondly at her
"Feathertop" than Samuel now gazed at Abraham puffing away on his pipe;
but he determined that Abraham's fate should not be as poor
"Feathertop's." Abe must remain a man.