The Boy with the U.S. Census | Page 5

thar bein' no available market if they did
work hard, what was the use o' workin'? Some o' them, 'specially down
in the gullies, got lazy an' shif'less. But they hung on all the harder to
the idees o' the old times,--honor an' hospitality."
"I've always understood," said Hamilton, "that there was more
hospitality to be found up here in the mountains than in almost any
place on the globe."
"As yo' said," the old man continued, "we're jes' like a crew o'
shipwrecked sailors marooned on an island without a boat, without any
means o' gettin' away. If some o' the families high up in the gullies are
ignorant, it's because they've had no schoolin', not because they haven'
got the makin's o' good citizens; if they're a bit careless about religion,
it's because they've had no churchin', an' if they don' pay much heed to
law, it's because the law has never done much for them. The ocean o'
progress," went on the mountaineer, with a flourish, "has rolled all
'roun' the mount'ns, but of all the fleets o' commerce in all these years,
thar has not been one to send out a boat to help the marooned
mount'neer."
"Didn't they ever try to get help?" queried the boy.
"We're not askin' help," the Kentuckian said, "thar's no whinin' on the

mount'ns. I jes' tell yo' that when the time comes for the mount'neers o'
Kentucky an' Virginia an' Tennessee an' Carolina to get a fair chance,
they'll show yo' as fine a race o' men an' women as the Stars an' Stripes
flies over."
"They are mighty fine right now, I think," the boy said.
"They have their good points," the Kentuckian agreed; "thar's nothin'
sneakin' in the men up hyeh, an' thar an't any lengths to which a man
won't go, to do what he thinks is the squar thing. You've heard about
the Beaupoints?"
"No," the boy answered, "what was that?"
"It was jes' an incident in one o' these feuds that you were talkin' of, an'
I'm goin' to tell yo' about it, to show yo' what a mount'neer's idee o'
honor is like. Thar was a family livin' on the other side o' the Ridge, not
a great ways from hyeh, by the name o' Calvern, an' in some way or
other--I never heard the rights of it--they took to shootin' up the
Beaupoints every chance that come along. One day Dandie Beaupoint
found a little girl that had hurt herself, an' he picked her up in his arms
an' was carryin' her home when one o' the Calvern boys shot him in his
tracks. One o' the Beaupoint brothers was away at the time, but the
others felt that the Calverns hadn't b'n playin' fair, an' they reckoned to
lay them all out. They did, too, all but one, an', although they had a
chance to nail him, they let him alone."
"Why was he let off?" queried Hamilton.
"I reckon it was because he had a young wife an' a little child," the old
man answered. "Now Jim Beaupoint, the one that had been away, he
come home after a while, an' hadn't happened to hear about the wipin'
out o' the Calverns. On his way home, he had to pass the Calvern place,
an' so he made a wide cast aroun' the hill to keep out o' sight, when
suddenly, up a gully, he saw this Hez Calvern standin' there with his
rifle on his arm, an', quick as he could move, Jim grabbed his gun an'
fired. It was a long shot an' a sure one."

"Was it--" the boy began, but the old man waved the interruption aside
and proceeded.
"Reloadin' his rifle, Jim Beaupoint rode slowly to whar Hez Calvern
was lyin', when suddenly, from a clump o' bushes close by, there come
a rifle shot, an' the rider got the bullet in his chest. Befo' fallin' from the
saddle, however, the young fellow fired at the bushes from which
smoke was driftin', an' a shrill scream told him that the sharpshooter
was a woman."
"Some one who had been with Hez Calvern?" asked Hamilton.
"His wife. Well, although Jim was mortally hurt an' sufferin'--as the
tracks showed afterwards--he tried to drag himself to the bushes in
order to help the woman who had shot him an' who he had shot
unknowin'; but he was too badly hurt, an' he died twenty yards from the
place whar he fell."
"Was the woman dead, too?" asked Hamilton.
"No, but terrible badly hurt. What I was wantin' to tell yo', though, was
the result of all this. Wa'al, the Beaupoints took the woman to their
home an' nursed her night an' day for five long years. She was helpless,
only for