The Right of the Strongest

ernoon was no time for farmers to loaf. The stable-boy clerk was fulfilling the first of his offices out In the tin-can district at the back of the store. Only Uncle Beck remained to tell the story, and he was plainly nodding over the latest edition of " Hos- tetter's Almanac." When John Marshall and his magnificent pointer came in out of the crisping evening to share the warmth of the little rusty stove, mine host at once roused himself to the duties of his position. The proffer of the surest-legged chair, a vigorous punching down of ashes, and the right of way through a large plug of tobacco at once showed that he was thoroughly awake and on his job. Both chair and tobacco were declined, however, and the stranger stood leisurely by the counter while he traded for some half-dozen articles in which he evinced strangely little interest. Nevertheless, he talked pleasantly enough about the weather, the prospects for a cold winter, and about the neighborhood in general, saying some kindly things about some of the people whom he had met here. It seemed perfectly natural, after his desultory buying was finished, that he and Uncle Beck should pull up chairs to the glowing stove and drift into a little neighborly gossip. "A lot of waste land about here," the stranger ventured, after he had duly asked about the condition of the store-keeper's crops; "I wonder you don't get rid of some of it." "Wa-al, land ain't apt to run off nowhar, an' hit don't git in nobody...