DUTCH CORNERS DAYS 
BY ROSCOE BRUMBAUGH 
A Smash-Up at the Love—Feast 
ILLUSTRATED BY ROY MARTELL MASON 
TT CH COR- 
neko. 1S) a 
Place; a peace- 
ful Pennsylva- 
nia valley, pro- 
ductive of fine 
wheat, thrifty 
men and wom- 
en, grotesque su- 
, perstitions and 
bad boys. In Dutch Corners, it is safe 
to say, life is as serious and vexing a 
problem as in any other community ; 
though, of course, affairs there have 
mainly to do with livestock, crops and 
the weather. 
“Slim” Davis is a big man in the 
Corners. He is everybody’s friend; 
old and young tell him their troubles. 
All the scandals, all the gossip, the next 
weddin’, the best way to “break” a colt 
—these things Slim is well versed in. 
In the first place, he is worthy of ad- 
miration physically. Nature gave him 
the body and heart of a god, and then 
put him in the most obscure corner of 
the world just to see how freakish she 
could be. A man of 25, a six-footer, 
blue eyes, light brown hair, and a (once 
a week) smooth-shaven, swarthy face 
that is always wreathed in smiles; add 
to this ’most any sort of rural “clothes,” 
except for an ancient felt hat, which 
never had a mate, tilted far back on 
his head—that’s Slim. 
Slim had been planning for a month 
to take Grace Burger to the church 
love-feast, a communion peculiar to 
the Dunkard sect, which consists of a 
supper and feet-washing. He was “not 
much on religion,” as he said; and it 
was often whispered about that he 

made light of some of the beliefs of his 
neighbors and friends. But Grace, a 
girl of gentle, old-fashioned ways, who 
was as sincere in her picturesque re- 
ligion as in her week-day duties, Grace 
believed as her father and mother did. 
That fact made Slim more tolerant and 
less outspoken, for he had liked Grace 
from childhood. Why, they had writ- 
ten notes to each other in the little red 
schoolhouse, and gone to spellin’ bees 
together under blossoming skies the 
splendor of which lit up a dull, dark 
world. 
Memories like these came to Slim 
as he read Grace’s note saying she had 
changed her mind and would go to the 
love-feast with her folks. 
“Now what in Sam Hill can that 
mean?” mused Slim, as he finished the 
note for the fifth or sixth time on his 
way home from town, with a December 
blizzard beating savagely on his honest 
face. “Somepin durn queer some- 
wheres,” he said, half aloud. ‘“Nukh, 
it’s not Grace. Some fool notion of 
that deacon of a dad o’ hers.” 
The extreme simplicity of his life 
forbade much philosophizing on Slim’s 
part. Everything was matter of fact 
with him, as with the vast majority. 
Not that he was incapable of suffering, 
but he had too much “hard sense,” 
acquired through contact with elemen- 
tal forces. He possessed a vague, care- 
less faith in the goodness of things as 
they transpire—‘“kill all the kickin’ 
horses.” That such a little broken en- 
gagement, unless something unforeseen 
should bring them together again, 
might change the whole course of their 
lives, make or mar their happiness, 
