and his heirs.

They owned most all of the village they lived in. His pa had owned the
township the village was built on, and had built most all the village
himself, and rented the buildings. He owned a big manufactory there, and
the buildings rented high.

Wall, it wus in the second year of their marriage that that old college
chumb--(and I wish he had been chumbed by a pole, before he had ever gone
there). He had lost his property, and come down in the world, and had to
work for a livin'; moved into that village, and opened a drinking-saloon
and billiard-room.

He had been Paul's most intimate friend at college, and his evil genius,
so his mother said. But he was bright, witty, generous in a way,
unprincipled, dissipated. And he wanted Paul's company, and he wanted
Paul's money; and he had a chin himself, and knew how to manage them that
hadn't any.

Wall, Cicely and his mother tried to keep Paul from that bad influence.
But he said it would look shabby to not take any notice of a man because
he wus down in the world. He wouldn't have much to do with him, but it
wouldn't do to not notice him at all. How curius, that out of good comes
bad, and out of bad, good. That was a good-natured idee of Paul's if he
had had a chin that could have held up his principle; but he didn't.

So he gradually fell under the old influence again. He didn't mean to. He
hadn't no idee of doin' so when he begun. It was the chin.

He begun to drink hard, spent his nights in the saloon, gambled,--slipped