308 OLD BILL. 



ing circus. He said it was Dan Rice's, and I have 

 now no means of learning whether it was ever in that 

 section of the country or not. At all events, this 

 horse had broken through a culvert and had been im- 

 paled on a splintered rail. The men had him up when 

 Carey came along, and as they could not take the 

 horse with them in that condition and could not stop, 

 they made a bargain with him to take care of the 

 horse and they would send for him in a couple of 

 weeks. Whether they sent of not, Carey did not 

 know ; at all events, no one ever came to the clearing. 

 He named him Old Bill, after a dog that had died a 

 few weeks before the horse was added to Carey's 

 worldly possessions. The horse recovered, but had 

 the rim-burst referred to. It did not lower him one 

 iota in his new owner's estimation, and as the horse 

 that could pull the most was the most valuable in 

 that community, "Old Bill" was soon the "cock of the 

 walk," as Carey expressed it. 



In due time we arrived at the Corners. It was sim- 

 ply a place where four roads met, and, as I remember 

 it now, there were but three houses with a few barns 

 and a section of what had once been a shed. One of 

 these buildings was either a school or a church, pos- 

 .sibly both, while the other two were supposed to be 

 hotels. One was the old house. It was a long, low 

 affair, painted white, with dull, brown colored win- 

 dows and doors. It had that woe-begon appearance 

 which clings to a house that has lost its trade, while 

 the sheds and barns looked as if they were run down 

 at the heel. The other house was two and a half 

 stories high, and had, to all appearances, been built 

 two or three years. It had never been painted and 



