A Tar-Heel Baron

gh th

d to heel one of the hounds that had preferred to stay in his old home with an unknown master rather than endure the preca

me cornfield high on the side of the mountain, he saw a mass of fog rolling towards him, and before he could descend below its level he found himself enveloped in the mist of a p

upon the leaf tips and to drip upon him. The dog did not answer to his whistle. There were no points of the compass; there was no view of the valley below. He was like a ship rudderle

bray of a hungry mule, and he found himself close upon a cabin, an

ence kept recurring to him during the days

court. A group of lawyers laughed and gossiped at the front. A larger number of men, who proved to be potential jurors, gathered on one side and talked toget

whisky cases that fill so fully the docket of this court. From their appearance it was impossible to tell which were the law-breakers and which the bearers of testimony against them. There were old men and boys. Children were clinging to the skirts of their mothers,

f unwashed bodies and of moist tobacco, and

canned the mass behind it. He easily singled out von Rittenheim, wh

," he called, "step

ed Friedrich, looking at him through the sq

ce a day and see how the list stands. Some of these are old cases crowded out of the last term, and we may not get to you unti

ve me pain," Fri

called to-day, anyway. You'd

the honorable judge come in. It is m

ething like pity in his upward glance at the drawn

urt! th

es behind the bar, and stood to ack

he did not regard him as the arbiter of his fate, since he had learned the customary sentence

he method of drawing the jurors. He left this task still in process of

k in great draughts of its light purity, and his blood raced so merrily that he grew confused. Always the pain bit int

riminals were at every step. They gazed curiously into the lighted shop-windows; they talked in groups that overflowed the curbstone into the gutter. In a vacant lot back of

not eat his supper, and he spent a restless night, filled with horrid dreams. Sydney was selling whisky to Mr. Weaver. The Judge turned into Dr. Morgan, who grin

oom choked him, and his head throbbed unceasingly,

ullet that was speeding from his revolver to Dr. Morgan's heart, and found its resting-pla

ething, as penetrable as mist, as keen as the sting of conscience, as inevitable as the burden of life, seemed to inwra

ent out to meet again the lantern-jawed mountaineers, who, li

r a criminal offence; he was a criminal, a crimina

omes to women with uncertain husbands. She cuffed the child, and then shook him to still the uproar she had created. Two more children sat on the curb beyond her, and beyond them, up Haywood Street, men leaned against t

an, accused of fraudulently obtaining a pension, was explaining vo

made themselves comfortable in the abandoned seats, with much scraping of c

tor of the laws of his country with Sextus and Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot. The national eagle had been insulted in his nest, and his screams were

and wondered idly why the man was such a fool, not knowing that it was the prese

a constant shuffling of feet and a restless moving of hands. Friedrich found himself smothered by the evil-smelling clothes of his companions as he sat against the wall,

e of Wilder, the deputy-marshal. Their eyes met, and the malice in the officer's drove the German mad. How long must he stand here and

y bread and then tempted me? He who ate my last mouthful, and then offered me an unlawful chance to get more? Is the law of hospitality to be held of no account? And how is he innocent who poses as my friend, who drinks from my cup, who holds my hand in his, and who goes f

emotion of his tense face. So insistently did the words ring in his ears that it seemed to him that he must have spoken them aloud. Yet he was c

Weaver, and looked on at the conversation

oonshine cases, and you-all surely won't come on u

Friedrich, and stu

wall, that he might be sure to keep his balance a

ulsed painfully up into his brain; his eyes burned back in their sockets until the two shafts of anguish met in one well-nigh unbearable torture. The cloud-

served as a dock. He raised his hand, and heard afar off some words about the truth and God.

m gu

he sat down, conscious of a strange

ade," and a long and detailed account of "the Dutchy's" resistance to arrest, in which the ferocit

ng to say, and he heard himself re

and swelled again, and Friedrich wondered if "example" would be "Muster" or "Bei

silence, and the J

s or a hundr

e was a long,