A long groan from Sam now called all attention his way.

“Well, if it ain’t Sam Raften,” said Biddy coldly.

“Yes, an’ he’s deathly sick,” added Granny.  “Their own docther guv him up an said mortal man couldn’t save him nohow, so he jest hed to come to me.”

Another long groan was ample indorsement.

“Le’s see.  Gimme my scissors, Biddy; I’ll hev to cut the pant leg aff.”

“No, no,” Sam blurted out with sudden vigour, dreading the consequences at home.  “I kin roll it up.”

“Thayer, thot’ll do.  Now I say,” said the witch.  “Yes, sure enough, thayer is proud flesh.  I moight cut it out,” said she, fumbling in her pocket (Sam supposed for a knife, and made ready to dash for the door), “but le’s see, no—­that would be a fool docther trick.  I kin git on without.”

“Yes, sure,” said Sam, clutching at the idea, “that’s just what a fool doctor would do, but you kin give me something to take that’s far better.”

“Well, sure an’ I kin,” and Yan and Sam breathed more freely.  “Shwaller this, now,” and she offered him a tin cup of water into which she spilled some powder of dry leaves.  Sam did so.  “An’ you take this yer bundle and bile it in two gallons of wather and drink a glassful ivery hour, an’ hev a loive chicken sphlit with an axe an’ laid hot on the place twicet ivery day, till the proud flesh goes, an’ it’ll be all right wid ye—­a fresh chicken ivery toime, moind ye.”

“Wouldn’t—­turkeys—­do—­better?” groaned Sam, feebly.  “I’m me mother’s pet, Granny, an’ expense ain’t any objek”—­a snort that may have meant mortal agony escaped him.

“Niver moind, now.  Sure we won’t talk of yer father an’ mother; they’re punished pretty bad already.  Hiven forbid they don’t lose the rest o’ ye fur their sins.  It ain’t meself that ’ud bear ony ill-will.”

A long groan cut short what looked like a young sermon.

“What’s the plant, Granny?” asked Yan, carefully avoiding Sam’s gaze.

“Shure, an’ it grows in the woods.”

“Yes, but I want to know what it’s like and what it’s called.”

“Shure, ‘tain’t like nothin’ else.  It’s just like itself, an’ it’s called Witch-hazel.

  “’Witch-hazel blossoms in the faal,
  To cure the chills and Fayvers aall,’

“as cracked Jimmy says.”

“I’ll show you some av it sometime,” said Biddy.

“Can it be made into Lung-balm?” asked Yan, mischievously.

“I guess we’ll have to go now,” Sam feebly put in.  “I’m feeling much better.  Where’s my stick?  Here, Yan, you kin carry my medicine, an’ be very keerful of it.”

Yan took the bundle, not daring to look Sam in the face.

Granny bade them both come back again, and followed to the door with a hearty farewell.  At the same moment she said: 

“Howld on!” Then she went to the one bed in the room, which also was the house, turned down the clothes, and in the middle exposed a lot of rosy apples.  She picked out two of the best and gave one to each of the boys.