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All the while he wuz a goin’ on and a sayin’ all this I kep’ up a thinkin’, for I knew that Zekiel was a middlin’ good boy, and had been misused by the Deacon, so I had hearn—had been worked beyend his strength, and whipped, and didn’t get enough to eat, so the boy said.

The Deacon had took him for his board and clothes; but his board wuz hard indeed, and very knotty, and his clothes wuz very light, very.

And so, bein’, as I spoze, sort o’ drove to it, he riz. And as I say, the Deacon was madder than any hen I ever see, wet or dry.

“The idee,” sez he, “of that boy, that I have took care on ever sence he wuz a child, took care on him in health, and nussed him, and doctored him when he wuz sick” (lobelia and a little catnip wuz every mite of medicine he ever give him, and a little paregoric, so I have been told)—“the idee of that boy a leavin’ me—a rizin’ up and a sayin’ as pert as a piper, ‘If you don’t want to hire me, let me go.’”

“Wall, which did you do, Deacon?” sez I.

“Why, I hired the dumb upstart! I couldn’t get along without his work, and he knew it.”