Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

OUR NEIGHBORS 135
was most slow in all his movements; but once did we see him
moving rapidly, and that was upon a zero morning in winter.
While we were doing up the morning work we looked north,
and there on Brown 's hill we saw some one who reminded us
of "Crazy Charlie" coming down at a dog trot with his heavy
club cane and familiar bundle of rags. All the children shout-
ed: "It is 'Crazy Charlie'!" He was coming at such a gait
we could scarcely believe our eyes. He greeted us in a clear,
distinct voice, speaking of the weather. In pity we children
stirred up the fire and put on the cofFee-pot. We found him
ready to talk as never before. He spoke of his home in the
East, of the doctors and people he had known. He assured us
that when doctors found that the sick must die they gave
them a potion to get them out of their misery, and he seemed
to approve of this method. Our father had known him from
his first appearance in our neighborhood, but had never before
known him to express an opinion on any subject, so we felt a
new interest in him and hoped it might be an awakening; but
on his next round he came back the same slowly moving crea-
ture talking in a thick whisper. Thus for a period of some thirty
years he wandered over the country from Cincinnati to many
of the neighboring towns, though his favorite haunts were
ever the country places, where he could find lodging.
As the years went by Charlie's once splendid form— for he
was of fine physique— began to show the coming on of old age;
his hair was growing thin and white, his form was bent. He
kept his tall, broken-down hat full of rags to keep his poor head
warm, and a more forlorn and homeless man could not be
found. People out of pity applied to the charitable societies
for a comfortable place in which he might spend his declining
years, but not so: he would slipoutfromthesecharitable shelters
and be off on the road again. One day late in autumn, when
the leaves were drifting down, one of our neighbor boys,
while out hunting, found poor old Charlie down under the edge
of a fallen tree, endeavoring to keep out of the heavy rain
which comes with the late autumn. He was almost gone, but
John Preston went for help and the good neighbors warmed
and fed him until he revived, when he set out on another tramp.