HANDS 15

Jgjbeating the master, had begun to kick him about
éthe yard.
To Adolph Nlyers was driven from the Pennsyl=
ivania town in the night. With lanterns in their
géishands a dozen men came to the door of the house
gllwhere he lived alone and commanded that he dress
Eipand come forth. It was raining and one of the
ifmen had a rope in his hands. They had intended
 to hang the schoolmaster, but something in his
 figure, so small, white, and pitiful, touched their
;» hearts and they let him escape. As he ran away
i into the darkness they repented of their weakness
and ran after him, sxvearing and throwing 511115
yand great balls of soft mud at the figure that
screamed and ran faster and faster into the dark-
ness.

For twenty years {Xdolph Myerslladliggd alone
in Winesburg. He #52631? forty but looked sixty-
five.” The name of Biddlebaum he got from a
box of goods seen at a freight station as he hurried
through an eastern Ohio town. He had an aunt
in Winesburg, a black-toothed old woman who
raised chickens, and with her he lived until she
died. He had been ill for a year after the ex-
perience in Pennsylvania, and after his recovery
worked as a day laborer in the fields, going
timidly about and striving to conceal his hands.
Although he did not understand what had hap-

pened he felt that the hands must be to blame.