said, thess not quite six year old, an' ther seemed to be time
enough. But last week he had been playin' out o' doors bare-
feeted, thess same ez he always does, an' he tramped on a pine
splinter some way. Of co'se, pine, it's the safe-t-est splinter a
person can run into a foot, on account of its carryin' its own
turpentine in with it to heal up things; but any splinter thet
dast to push itself up into a little pink foot is a messenger of
trouble, an' we know it. An' so, when we see this one, we tried
ever' way to coax him to let us take it out, but he wouldn't, of
co'se. He never will, an' somehow the Lord seems to give 'em
ambition to work their own way out mos' gen'ally.

But, sir, this splinter didn't seem to have no energy in it. It
thess lodged there, an' his little foot it commenced to swell, an'
it swole an' swole tell his little toes stuck out so thet the
little pig thet went to market looked like ez ef it wasn't on
speakin' terms with the little pig thet stayed home, an' wife an'
me we watched it, an' I reckon she prayed over it consider'ble,
an' I read a extry psalm at night befo' I went to bed, all on
account o' that little foot. An' night befo' las' it was lookin'
mighty angry an' swole, an' he had limped an' "ouched!"
consider'ble all day, an' he was mighty fretful bed-time. So,
after he went to sleep, wife she come out on the po'ch where I was
settin', and she says to me, says she, her face all drawed up an'
workin', says she: "Honey," says she, "I reckon we better sen' for
him an' have it did." Thess so, she said it. "Sen' for who, wife?"
says I, "an' have what did?" "Why, sen' for him, the 'Piscopal
preacher," says she, "an' have Sonny christened. Them little toes
o' hisn is ez red ez cherry tomatoes. They burnt my lips thess now
like a coal o' fire an'--an' lockjaw is goin' roun' tur'ble.