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THE PIONEERS.

"Don't make the matter worse, 'duke, by pretending to talk about surgery," interrupted Mr. Jones, with a contemptuous wave of the hand; "it is a science that can only be learnt by practice. You know that my grandfather was a doctor, but you haven't got a drop of medical blood in your veins; these kind of things run in families. All my family by the father's side had a knack at physic. There was my uncle that was killed at Brandy wine, he died twice as easy as any other man in the regiment, only from knowing bow to do the thing as it ought to be done."

"I doubt not, Dickon," returned the Judge playfully, after meeting the bright smile, which, in spite of himself, stole over the stranger's features, "that thy family understood the art of letting a life slip through their fingers with great facility."

Richard heard him quite coolly, and, putting a hand in either pocket of his surtout, so as to press forward the skirts with an air of vast disdain, began to whistle a tune; but the desire to reply over came his philosophy, and with great heat he exclaimed——

"You may affect to smile, Judge Temple, at hereditary virtues, if you please; but there is not a man on your Patent who don't know better.—Here, even this young man, who has never seen any thing but bears, and deers, and wood-chucks, knows better, than not to believe in virtues being transmitted down in families. Don't you, friend?"

"I believe that vice is not," said the stranger abruptly, his eye glancing keenly from the father to the daughter.

"The Squire is right, Judge," observed Benjamin, with a knowing nod of his head towards Richard, that bespoke the cordiality between them. "Now, in the old country, the King's Ma-