Before I reached the house that afternoon, Euphemia rushed out to
tell this story. I would not like to say how far I kicked those
ham-bones.

This German girl had several successors, and some of them suited as
badly and left as abruptly as herself; but Euphemia never forgot
the ungrateful stab given her by this "ham-bone girl," as she
always called her. It was her first wound of the kind, and it came
in the very beginning of the campaign when she was all unused to
this domestic warfare.



CHAPTER VII.

TREATING OF AN UNSUCCESSFUL BROKER AND A DOG.


It was a couple of weeks, or thereabouts, after this episode that
Euphemia came down to the gate to meet me on my return from the
city. I noticed a very peculiar expression on her face. She
looked both thoughtful and pleased. Almost the first words she
said to me were these:

"A tramp came here to-day."

"I am sorry to hear that," I exclaimed. "That's the worst news I
have had yet. I did hope that we were far enough from the line of
travel to escape these scourges. How did you get rid of him? Was