he should take my name. Well, to make a long story short, I got killed
at Gettysburg and I wrote that out as a reminder."

"Don't you ever get lonesome alone here by yourself?" Quincy asked.

"Yes," said Uncle Ike. "I am lonesome every minute of the time. That's
what I came down here for. I got tired being lonesome with other people
around me, so I thought I would come down here and be lonesome all by
myself, and I have never been sorry I came."

Quincy opened his eyes and looked inquiringly at Uncle Ike.

"I don't quite understand what you mean by being lonesome with other
people around you," said he.

"No, of course you don't," replied Uncle Ike. "You are too young. I was
sixty. I was thirty-five when I got married and my wife was only
twenty-two, so when I was sixty she was only forty-seven. One girl was
twenty-three and the other twenty. I went to work at seven o'clock in
the morning and got home at seven at night. My wife and daughters went
to theatres, dinners, and parties, and of course I stayed at home and
kept house with the servant girl. In my business I had taken in two
young fellows as partners, both good, honest men, but soon they got to
figuring that on business points they were two and I was one, and pretty
soon all I had to do was to put wood on the fire and feed the office
cat. So you can see I was pretty lonesome about eighteen hours out of
the twenty-four."

Quincy said reflectively, "And your family--"