The Sunday morning news. [volume] (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1886-1891, 1891-01-11

was sskind o. curious" Jack Pedikin.
who kept the light on Ajax bar, called
him ssshucklessn and said that he sshed
no sperit, while even old Uncle Pitches,
who farmed FIVE acres Of cotton on Judge
Wyle's place, contemptuously called him
s,pore white trash" But this disturbed
the serenity Of Zeb Posey not one jot or
little, and year in and year out he made
his occasional trips to Lake Providence
with fish, and in the winter took In bum
dies OF beaver and otter pelts or bunch
Of ducks, and buying his few necessities
went away as unobtrusiyely as he had
come. Some of the fishermen knew
where he lived, but most people never
gave the subject thought. As q matter
Of fact Zeb lived in shack built among
the great cottonwood and sycamore trees
on the Mississippi shore, back Of Island
SIS, and with him lived his mother and
his sister Cordia, the latter q shy, bali
pretty child of 10. When Zeb built his
cabin there it was on the main channel
Of the river, bat during the high water
Of 10 the stream forced its way through
Point Lookout, left the end as an island,
and its old bed became the shallower
channel and was deserted by steamboats,.
This did not disturb Zeb in the least. If
anything, it pleased him. True he could
not sit in front of his cabin and watch
the great steamers go blowing by, but
he was only mile off the main stream.
and he could hear their whistles and
catch glimpse of their lights at night
as they fitted past the opening of the cut
of. Zeb's cabin stood on top of the
high bank, and be had carved fight Of
rude steps in the precipitous mud bluff
leading up from the narrow strip Of beach
below, where be tied his boat. It was
not pretantious home, but Zeb had
built it with his own hands out of great
cottonwood logs, chinked with saplings,
and had put chimney on one end,
wonderfully constructed from persim-
mon sticks, plastered with mud
Zeb was strange character. When
this incident IN his life which am
about to relate transpired he was
perhaps IS years Of age. He was tall
and slender and awkward-much sit-
ting In q slxiR had given his shoulders s
stoop His spare, almost lean face was
covered with thin, yellowish beard,
and his long hair had q grotesque FASH
ion Of falling down over his big, limo
cent gray eyes. In feeling. intent and
intellect Zeb always seemed like child.
He was intelligent enough, but he had
never come into that business contact
with men which makes other men shrewd
and mercenary and unsympathetic. His
perceptive faculties were keen enough
perhaps, but they had been developed in
abnormal directions. If any one thing
made him recluse it was because he
was difddent-modest Of his own ability
to make place and hold it. 81 amt
'tickisr,p he always said when his own
interests were at stake, and this idiomatic
expression was the keynote of his charac-
ter. Zeb Posey simply declined to be self
assertive. So when he went up to Lake
Providence or Ben Lomond, the largest
places he had ever known Familiarity, he
would sometimes hang upon the out
skirts of little knot of men such as
idly gathered in front of one Of the
stores and listen to their conversation,
but il any question was referred to him
he would grow suddenly nervous, shift
from one foot to the other uneasily and
slowly reply, 81 dun no; amt ticker. !"
But zeb preferred to live down back Of
s95" and go to the village as seldom as
possible. He was better content trap
ping 'coons" in the persimmon "fats"
back in the timber, or lying over the
edge of his skif in the still water, peer
ing down into the amber depths, or on
summer nights sitting in front of his
cabin watching the moon swinging like
the silver shield of Achilles above the
dark island His little patch of corn
and potatoes, supplementing the fruits
of his lines and traps, amply snfiiced for
the simple needs of the family, and il
there was but little their wants were
fewer and easily supplied without great
effort or the exercise of much ingenuity.
zeb's mother was an example of the
type Of woman developed by the condi-
tions under which river squatters
flourish and have their being. She was
tall and angular. with ''dead-and-
alive" expression of complacent misery.
Her hair was brushed back tight from
her temples and tied in knot behind
when it was brushed at all. She smoked
cob pipe and was densely ignorant.
Indeed, it seems to me her complaeenf
want Of knowledge is somehow better
explained by saying that she was s'obliy-
ious. Of those things which go to make
up the sum Of human knowledge. She
seemed in no wise to have taken part OF
been interested in any matter pertain
ing to people or affairs.
Cordia looked like her mother, except
that she was too young to have acquired
the habit of smoking, for that seems an
attribute of matronhood; and If she was
not pretty. still in vague way she was
interesting because of her shrinking
shyness and modesty. Somewhere the
0irl had learned to read in slow. un.
certain way, and colporteur who hat
visited that section once had given her 3
copy Of tho Bible, which Cordia had
stumbled through with great interest
skipping the hard words and the He
brew names and dwelling intently on
the warlike passages and the tendel