baldly from the model, I fell into an error common to inexperienced
writers. It is amusing to observe that these portrait characters seem
the least substantial of all the figures in the book. Dr. Small is a
rather unrealistic villain, but I knew him well and respected him in my
boyish heart for a most exemplary Christian of good family at the very
time that, according to testimony afterward given, he was diversifying
his pursuits as a practising physician by leading a gang of burglars.
More than one person has been pointed out as the original of Bud Means,
and I believe there are one or two men each of whom flatters himself
that he posed for the figure of the first disciple of the Church of the
Best Licks. Bud is made up of elements found in some of his race, but
not in any one man. Not dreaming that the story would reach beyond the
small circulation of _Hearth and Home_, I used the names of people in
Switzerland and Decatur counties, in Indiana, almost without being aware
of it. I have heard that a young man bearing the surname given to one of
the rudest families in this book had to suffer many gibes while a
student at an Indiana college. I here do public penance for my culpable
indiscretion.

"Jeems Phillips," name and all, is a real person whom at the time of
writing this story I had not seen since I was a lad of nine and he a man
of nearly forty. He was a mere memory to me, and was put into the book
with some slighting remarks which the real Jeems did not deserve. I did
not know that he was living, and it did not seem likely that the story
would have vitality enough to travel all the way to Indiana. But the
portion referring to Phillips was transferred to the county paper
circulating among Jeems' neighbors. For once the good-natured man was,
as they say in Hoosier, "mad," and he threatened to thrash the editor.
"Do you think he means you?" demanded the editor. "To be sure he does,"
said the champion speller. "Can you spell?" "I can spell down any master