A SORT OF PREFACE.

WHICH IT IS NOT NECESSARY TO READ.

When Josiah read my dedication he said "it wuz a shame to dedicate
a book that it had took most a hull bottle of ink to write, to a
lot of creeters that he wouldn't have in the back door yard."

But I explained it to him, that I didn't mean tramps with broken
hats, variegated pantaloons, ventilated shirt-sleeves, and
barefooted. But I meant tramps with diamond ear-rings, and
cuff-buttons, and Saratoga trunks, and big accounts at their
bankers.

And he said, "Oh, shaw!"

But I went on nobly, onmindful of that shaw, as female pardners
have to be, if they accomplish all the talkin' they want to.

And sez I, "It duz seem sort o' pitiful, don't it, to think how
sort o' homeless the Americans are a gettin'? How the posys that
blow under the winders of Home are left to waste their sweet
breaths amongst the weeds, while them that used to love 'em are a
climbin' mountain tops after strange nosegays."

The smoke that curled up from the chimbleys, a wreathin' its way
up to the heavens -- all dead and gone. The bright light that
shone out of the winder through the dark a tellin' everybody that
there wuz a Home, and some one a waitin' for somebody -- all dark