Richard Forrest, Bachelor — page 261: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

252 A LIVING SAINT. little knot of men were gathered. Day was just dawning, and the rising sun cast a roseate hne over the snow cov- ered land, lending to it an almost painful brilliancy. As far as the eye could reach stretched the dazzling white, dotted here and there with the dark-green of a clump of pines or tall cedar trees, whose branches drooped grace- fully under their spotless burden. The men, well muffled up—for the morning air was un- usually sharp—were talking and gazing intently along the unbroken road which wound up the mountain side. They were David Derby, his son, and four of his stable- men. ‘“"T’an’t no use, boss; no hosses couldn’t never live out t’rough a night like dat yer,’’ observed Uncle Sam, one of the older stable-men, a white-haired negro, shaking his head. ‘*O’ co’se not,’’ chimed in a second. ‘*Mo’ ’n likely day’s under a drif’, clean d’odder side o’ W’ite Cliff,’’ remarked another sage. David, who was shading his eyes with his mittened hand, vouchsafed no reply to this universal opinion. ‘‘Might as well give up expectin’ ’em, pa,’’ suggested his son, who was thoroughly chilled and hungry. ‘‘Maybe they didn’t start, after all.”’ ‘‘Sho’,’’ agreed the old stable-man, who also felt a long- ing for hoe cake steal over him. ‘‘Mebbe they didn’t.”’ “Shut up, the pack o’ you,’’ returned Derby, gruffly. ‘“Want to teach me my business, do you? Well, I can just worry along without any o’ yo’ advice, I kin tell you. That ’bus’ll come, or wedon’t go in all day. Understand?”’ They did, and a murmur of consternation arose. ‘But it’s so many hours late, pa,’’ persisted young CORMEMOOKS. COI