DRi and I | Page 6

had run my sword through the cat's belly and made an end of
him.
"Knew 'f he got them hind hooks on thet air dog he 'd rake his ribs right
off," said D'ri, as he lifted his hat to scratch his head. "Would n't 'a' left
nothin' but the backbone,--nut a thing,--an' thet would n't 'a' been a real
fust-class one, nuther."
When D'ri was very positive, his words were well braced with
negatives.
We took the painter by the hind legs and dragged him through the
bushes to our camp. The dog had a great rip across his shoulder, where
the claws had struck and made furrows; but he felt a mighty pride in
our capture, and never had a better appetite for a meal.
There were six more days of travel in that journey--travel so fraught
with hardships, I wonder that some days we had the heart to press on.
More than all, I wonder that the frail body of my mother was equal to it.
But I am writing no vain record of endurance. I have written enough to
suggest what moving meant in the wilderness. There is but one more
color in the scenes of that journey. The fourth day after we left
Chateaugay my grandmother fell ill and died suddenly there in the deep
woods. We were far from any village, and sorrow slowed our steps. We
pushed on, coming soon to a sawmill and a small settlement. They told
us there was neither minister nor undertaker within forty miles. My
father and D'ri made the coffin of planed lumber, and lined it with

deerskin, and dug the grave on top of a high hill. When all was ready,
my father, who had always been much given to profanity, albeit I know
he was a kindly and honest man with no irreverence in his heart, called
D'ri aside.
"D'ri," said he, "ye 've alwus been more proper-spoken than I hev. Say
a word o' prayer?"
"Don't much b'lieve I could," said he, thoughtfully. "I hev been t'
meeting but I hain't never been no great hand fer prayin'."
"'T wouldn't sound right nohow, fer me t' pray," said my father, "I got s'
kind o' rough when I was in the army."
"'Fraid it 'll come a leetle unhandy fer me," said D'ri, with a look of
embarrassment, "but I don't never shirk a tough job ef it hes t' be done."
Then he stepped forward, took off his faded hat, his brow wrinkling
deep, and said, in a drawling preacher tone that had no sound of D'ri in
it: "O God, tek care o' gran'ma. Help us t' go on careful, an' when we 're
riled, help us t' keep er mouths shet. O God, help the ol' cart, an' the ex
in pertic'lar. An' don't be noway hard on us. Amen."

II
June was half over when we came to our new home in the town of
Madrid--then a home only for the foxes and the fowls of the air and
their wild kin of the forest. The road ran through a little valley thick
with timber and rock-bound on the north. There were four families
within a mile of us, all comfortably settled in small log houses. For
temporary use we built a rude bark shanty that had a partition of
blankets, living in this primitive manner until my father and D'ri had
felled the timber and built a log house. We brought flour from
Malone,--a dozen sacks or more,--and while they were building, I had
to supply my mother with fish and game and berries for the table--a
thing easy enough to do in that land of plenty. When the logs were cut
and hewn I went away, horseback, to Canton for a jug of rum. I was all

day and half the night going and coming, and fording the Grasse took
me stirrups under.
Then the neighbors came to the raising--a jolly company that shouted
"Hee, oh, hee!" as they lifted each heavy log to its place, and grew
noisier quaffing the odorous red rum, that had a mighty good look to
me, although my father would not hear of my tasting it. When it was all
over, there was nothing to pay but our gratitude.
While they were building bunks, I went off to sawmill with the oxen
for boards and shingles. Then, shortly, we had a roof over us, and floors
to walk on, and that luxury D'ri called a "pyaz," although it was not
more than a mere shelf with a roof over it. We chinked the logs with
moss and clay at first, putting up greased paper in the window spaces.
For months we knew not the luxury of the glass pane.
That summer we "changed