jing! I had to!--Huh!--My old dad would just naturally a took th' hide
off me if I hadn't. Yes sir-ee, you bet I went to church. But all the
same I didn't want to. An' they sorter foundered me on religi'n, I
reckon, Jim and Bill and Tom and Dave. They'd all take their girls and
go home with them after meetin', an' I'd have to put out the team and
feed the stock all alone; an' Sunday evenin' every one of 'em would
be off to singin' and I'd have to milk and feed again. An' then after
meetin' of course the boys had to take their girls home, and other
fellows would come home with our girls, and I'd have to put up the
team and take care of the boys' horses that come sparkin'. An' somehow
I didn't take to Christianity. To-be-sure, 'twas a good thing fer the
stock I didn't."

He carefully knocked the ashes from his cigar and continued:
"To-be-sure, I know now that wasn't no excuse, but it looked that way
then. After a while the boys married off and I staid to home and took
care of the old folks; and purty soon the girls they got married too;
and then pa and ma got too old to go out, and I couldn't leave 'em
much, and so I didn't get to meetin' very often. Things went on that
way a spell 'til Bill got to thinkin' he'd better come and live on the
home farm and look after things, as I didn't have no woman; to-be-sure,
it did need a good bit of tendin'. Six hundred acres all in fine shape
and well stocked--so I told pa that I'd come west an let 'em run things
at home. I got a job punchin' steers out here in James County, and
they're all back there yet. The old folks died a little bit after I
came west, and Bill--well--Bill, he keeps the home place 'cause he
took care of 'em ye know--well, I homesteaded a hundred and sixty, and
after a spell, the Santa Fe road come through and I got to buyin' grain
and hogs, and tradin' in castor-oil beans and managed to get hold of
some land here when the town was small. To-be-sure, I aint rich yet,