A DAY'S DRIVE IN THREE STATES 7 



of surprise, looked at me, — " Ah, a North- 

 ern man," so I read his thoughts, — and in- 

 continently slipped the bill into his pocket. 

 A rarity like that was not for the cash drawer 

 and the daily course of business. I might 

 almost as well have given him a two-dollar 

 gold coin ; like the pious heroine of a Sun- 

 day-school story I was reading the other 

 day, who dropped into the contribution-box 

 a " fifty-dollar gold piece " ! 



The rain, concerning whose destructive 

 power my colored boy had been so appre- 

 hensive, very soon set in, and left me nothing 

 to do but to make the best of an afternoon 

 upon the hotel piazza, with its outlook up 

 and down the village street, and its gossip 

 and politics. As to the latter I played the 

 part of listener, in spite of sundry courteous 

 attempts to draw me out. Tillman and the 

 silver question were discussed with a wel- 

 come coolness of spirit, while I looked at an 

 occasional passing horseman (it is the one 

 advantage of poor roads that they keep an 

 entire community in the saddle), or admired 

 the evolutions of the chimney swifts and 

 the martins. Roses and honeysuckles would 

 have made the dooryards beautiful, had that 



