Bermuda, but the people are very abstemious in the matter of dogs. Two
or three nights we prowled the country far and wide, and never once were
accosted by a dog. It is a great privilege to visit such a land. The
cats were no offense when properly distributed, but when piled they
obstructed travel.

As we entered the edge of the town that Sunday afternoon, we stopped at a
cottage to get a drink of water. The proprietor, a middle-aged man with
a good face, asked us to sit down and rest. His dame brought chairs, and
we grouped ourselves in the shade of the trees by the door. Mr. Smith
--that was not his name, but it will answer--questioned us about ourselves
and our country, and we answered him truthfully, as a general thing, and
questioned him in return. It was all very simple and pleasant and
sociable. Rural, too; for there was a pig and a small donkey and a hen
anchored out, close at hand, by cords to their legs, on a spot that
purported to be grassy. Presently, a woman passed along, and although
she coldly said nothing she changed the drift of our talk. Said Smith:

"She didn't look this way, you noticed? Well, she is our next neighbor
on one side, and there's another family that's our next neighbors on the
other side; but there's a general coolness all around now, and we don't
speak. Yet these three families, one generation and another, have lived
here side by side and been as friendly as weavers for a hundred and fifty
years, till about a year ago."

"Why, what calamity could have been powerful enough to break up so old a
friendship?"

"Well, it was too bad, but it couldn't be helped. It happened like this:
About a year or more ago, the rats got to pestering my place a good deal,