THE WITCH OF SMOKY HOLLOW 161 
His persistency impressed the father, so that he 
made his way to the spot on the crest of the hill 
overlooking the hollow. There he saw the smoke 
unmistakably rising from the great stack of chim- 
neys. Muttering to himself, ' Where there's smoke 
there's fire, an' where there's fire there's some one to 
light it,' he started back again quicker than he had 
come. 
The same evening he was the hero at the public- 
house, where he repeated the story, saying over and 
over again, ' The thing hed cum tu pass, as I allus 
sed they wud, whoever lived long enuf tu see it. 
Wut is tu be wull be, in coorse o' natur, an' nuthin' 
ken stan' agin it, nor yet perwent it ; fur mark my 
wurds, if summut hain't cum back agin, an' I've sin it.' 
For the latter fact he drew on his imagination, as 
he forgot he was indebted to his son for the infor- 
mation concerning the lady. The company were 
edified, and asked him to ' hev a wet,' over and over 
again. 
A few days later his story was confirmed. A bad 
accident happened to one of a party of woodmen 
who were felling trees in the neighbourhood of the 
old house. A mate's axe, glancing off from the 
trunk of a tree, struck him on the arm, cutting it 
badly. The pain and loss of blood being great, they 
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