'
'Meet him? Why, Gopher, my poor fellow, he is
dead!'
'That's why I'm afraid of 'im.'
I followed the little wretch back to his wagon and
wrung his hand at parting. It was now nightfall,
and as I stood there at the roadside in the deepen-
ing gloom, watching the blank outlines of the reced-
ing wagon, a sound was borne to me on the evening
wind--a sound as of a series of vigorous thumps
--and a voice came out of the night:
'Gee-up, there, you derned old Geranium.'
A JUG OF SYRUP
THIS narrative begins with the death of its hero.
Silas Deemer died on the I6th day of July, 1863;
and two days later his remains were buried. As he
had been personally known to every man, woman
and well-grown child in the village, the funeral, as
the local newspaper phrased it, 'was largely at-
tended.' In accordance with a custom of the time
and place, the coffin was opened at the graveside and
the entire assembly of friends and neighbours filed
past, taking a last look at the face of the dead.
And then, before the eyes of all, Silas Deemer was
put into the ground. Some of the eyes were a trifle
dim, but in a general way it may be said that at that
interment where was lack of neither observance nor
observation; Silas was indubitably dead, and none
could have pointed out any ritual delinquency that
would have justified him in coming back from the
grave. Yet if human testimony is good for anything
(and certainly it once put an end to witchcraft
in and about Salem) he came back.
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