HOVSEKEEPINO IN A BASKET. 383 



color showing distinctly even against the age-browned 

 boards. How did the dog- tracks get there f In one 

 corner of the roof are the indistinct outlines of a pair 

 of naked human feet. Some one seems to have scrubbed 

 there until they are recognized ■with difficulty, but 

 human footprints they certainly are. 



The origin of these " tracks " has been for many 

 years a fruitful subject for gossip among humbler 

 country-side folk. But there is not much mystery 

 about it according to the Townes family tradition. 

 The board-yard at which the lumber was bought was 

 also the tan-yard, and feet that had passed through 

 the liquid tan had walked across and left their prints 

 upon the boards which good Friend Townes had 

 loaded up for his new^ house. No one thought worth 

 while to plane them off, and so they were nailed down, 

 tracks and all ! Many a tidy housekeeper had tried 

 her hands and temper at the task of scrubbing off the 

 marks ; but at last they came to be valued for their 

 oddity. Kevertheless, there was this disadvantage, 

 that in some minds the mysterious dog-tracks awakened 

 nearly as much consternation as did the " handwriting 

 on the Avail " at Belshazzar's feast. 



Poor Dan of course fell a victim to the mystery. 

 Who would accept so simple an explanation as that 

 which we have given ? Too plain entirely, that ! No, 

 no ; the feet that left those prints upon the ceiling 

 were not of mortal mold ! The room " wasn't zactly 

 ' /lOJiiec?, ' " Dan agreed, but he steadily refused to 

 compromise himself with the " sperits " by entering 



