on her feet, fur nuthin'. Her darter-in-law tole me ez the only way
ter find out how nimble she really be war ter box one o' her
gran'chill'n, an' then she'd bounce out'n her cheer, an' jounce
round the room after thar daddy or mammy, whichever hed boxed the
chill'n. That fursaken couple always hed ter drag thar chill'n out
in the woods, out'n earshot of the house, ter whip 'em, an' then
threat 'em ef they dare let thar granny know they hed been struck.
But elsewise she hed ter be lifted from her bed ter her cheer by the
h'a'th. She wouldn't hev HER sperit seen a-walkin' way up hyar a-
top o' the mounting, like enny healthy harnt, fur nuthin' in this
worl'. Whatever 'twar, 'twarn't HER. An' I reckon of the truth war
knowed, 'twarn't nuthin' at all--forg, mebbe."

This stalwart reasoning served to steady his nerves a little. And
when the moon went down and the day was slowly breaking, he took his
way, with a vacillating intention and many a chilling doubt, along
the winding road to the scene of his fright.

It was not yet time by a good hour or more to go to work, and
nothing was stirring. A wan light was on the landscape when he came
in sight of the great tree prone upon the ground. And there, close
to the edge of the road, as if she had stepped aside to let him
pass, was the figure of a little, bent old woman--nay, in the
brightening dawn, a bush--a blackberry bush, clad in a blue-checked
apron, a red plaid shawl, and with a neat sunbonnet nodding on its
topmost spray.

His first emotion was intense relief. Then he stood staring at the
bush in rising indignation. This sandy by-way of a road led only to
his own house, and this image of a small and bent old woman had