68 FORTY-FOUR YKAR8 OF 



days we left them lay where we shot them ; and I think it 

 was on the fifth day that uncle left me to manage the 

 balance. I continued shooting for nine and a half days, 

 till I could see but one more squirrel, and that was a black 

 one. 



When I had completely exterminated the squirrels, Mr. 

 P'oot paid me nine silver dollars, which I added to my 

 stock, and thought I was quite well off. Still further to 

 help me, my step-father and my mother had bought me a 

 complete new suit of clothes ; but I had to work for the 

 tailor who made them. 



I went to work at my new job heart and hand ; and 

 when I was through I began to think of the " Blooming 

 Rose " again, and Mary McMullen. I labored on, how- 

 ever, till at length I proposed to mother that I should go 

 and see my old friends; to which she agreed, on condition 

 that I would promise to return to her again ; which I did 

 in the most positive terms. 



In a week or two I was ready, and set off for Allegany 

 County again. Two days subsequently I was at my uncle 

 James Spurgin's, in Monongahela County, in a very dif- 

 ferent situation from what I was in when I left there the 

 previous January, though I had only been gone about 

 seven months. I showed them my clothes, besides from 

 twenty to thirty dollars in silver, which I had in my pocket, 

 and described all that I had seen. I told uncle how near 

 I had been to getting in a scrape by breaking the mule's 

 shoulder, and also how I remembered his advice, and had 

 made up my mind, if the question had been asked, to tell 

 the whole truth, and see what it would do for me. 



"Well, Meshach," said he, "if Mr. Caldwell is the man 

 you represent him to be, he would not have made you pay 

 one penny for it ; and on the other hand, if he had dis- 

 covered that you did break the mule's leg, and that you 

 had tried to clear yourself from blame by telling a lie, he 



