The Second Chance

joke lieth in the

akes

was joined by his nearest neighbour, Thomas Perkins, who was o

enance and dewy blue eyes; his skin was of that quality that is easily

r, I'm glad to see you; the little house looked lonely since Bill and t

Watson asked, while the other

ould take ten thousand dollars now to get me off of old seventeen, north half; you see, I won my bet, but poor Bill lost his. Still, it wasn't a fair race. Bill would have won it if the Government hadn't put the whiskey in his way. You can be pretty sure it's whiskey that wins it for the Governme

other man nudged him genially and

x cents, didn't she take it from me to keep. It was harder to get it back from her than to earn it-oh, gosh! you know what the Scotch are like. Ye see, my mother died when I was a little fellow, and the old man married again, a great big, raw-boned, rangey l

son said, after

for six years, it was hard-year of the frozen wheat, too-oh, yes, 'tain't all easy. Now, there's old Bruce Simpson, back there at Pelican Lake. It would just do you good to be there of a mornin.' He has four boys and four girls, and just at the clip of five o'clock them lads jump out of bed-the eight feet hit the floor at the same

," said Jo

hat was the Graham comin' out of her-and I says, says I 'Edie, my dear, run along now and let me hear you play a toon on the cream separator or the milkin'-stool,' says I; 'there's more money in it.' But, by George! the wife kept at me, too, about this piano business, just pesterin' the very life out o' me, until I got sick of it. But I got them one at last-I was at a sale in Brandon, last fall, and I got one for eighty dollars. I told them it cost four hundred-you have to do it, when you're dealin' with wimmin'-they like things

me to draw poles from the big bush. Old George Steadman is a sly old rooster, and the other day he comes up to me in Millford, snuffin like a settin' goose, and I saw there was something on his mind. 'What's wrong, George?' I said. 'It's about them oats you promised me for seed,' he said. I had promised him some of my W

tient listener on the back

so eternally proud of his land. He has nineteen hundred acres

when he started?"

n this country, with the understandin' he'd pay her back in the fall. Well, the crop didn't turn out well and he couldn't pay her, so she sold the cow, and the kids had to do without milk. Well, I must be goin' now to see how things are goin'. I don't work much-I just kinda loaf around and take car

grateful surprise and thank

rs having to work. Look out for the black one-he's a sly old dog, and looks to me like an ox tha

d inquiries for his wife and family. From within came the mellow hum of the cream-sep

rm and colour; each shore of the lake was slashed into innumerable bays, edged with brightest gold; above this were richest shades' of pale yellow, deepening into

then said, more to himself than to