My Well and What Came Out of It

by Frank Stockton

Early in my married life I bought a small country estate which mywife and I looked upon as a paradise. After enjoying its delightfor a little more than a year our souls were saddened by thediscovery that our Eden contained a serpent. This was aninsufficient water-supply.It had been a rainy season when we first went there, and fora long time our cisterns gave us full aqueous satisfaction, butearly this year a drought had set in, and we were obliged to beexceedingly careful of our water.It was quite natural that the scarcity of water for domesticpurposes should affect my wife much more than it did me, andperceiving the discontent which was growing in her mind, Idetermined to dig a well. The very next day I began to look fora well-digger. Such an individual was not easy to find, for inthe region in which I lived wells had become unfashionable; but Idetermined to persevere in my search, and in about a week I founda well-digger.He was a man of somewhat rough exterior, but of aningratiating turn of mind. It was easy to see that it was hisearnest desire to serve me."And now, then," said he, when we had had a littleconversation about terms, "the first thing to do is to find outwhere there is water. Have you a peach-tree on the place?" Wewalked to such a tree, and he cut therefrom a forked twig."I thought," said I, "that divining-rods were always of hazelwood.""A peach twig will do quite as well," said he, and I havesince found that he was right. Divining-rods of peach will turnand find water quite as well as those of hazel or any other kindof wood.He took an end of the twig in each hand, and, with the pointprojecting in front of him, he slowly walked along over the grassin my little orchard. Presently the point of the twig seemed tobend itself downward toward the ground."There," said he, stopping, "you will find water here.""I do not want a well here," said I. "This is at the bottomof a hill, and my barn-yard is at the top. Besides, it is toofar from the house.""Very good," said he. "We will try somewhere else."His rod turned at several other places, but I had objectionsto all of them. A sanitary engineer had once visited me, and hehad given me a great deal of advice about drainage, and I knewwhat to avoid.We crossed the ridge of the hill into the low ground on theother side. Here were no buildings, nothing which wouldinterfere with the purity of a well. My well-digger walkedslowly over the ground with his divining-rod. Very soon heexclaimed: "Here is water!" And picking up a stick, hesharpened one end of it and drove it into the ground. Thenhe took a string from his pocket, and making a loop in one end,he put it over the stick."What are you going to do?" I asked."I am going to make a circle four feet in diameter," he said."We have to dig the well as wide as that, you know.""But I do not want a well here," said I. "It's too close tothe wall. I could not build a house over it. It would not do atall."He stood up and looked at me. "Well, sir," said he, "willyou tell me where you would like to have a well?""Yes," said I. "I would like to have it over there in thecorner of the hedge. It would be near enough to the house; itwould have a warm exposure, which will be desirable in winter;and the little house which I intend to build over it would lookbetter there than anywhere else."He took his divining-rod and went to the spot I hadindicated. "Is this the place?" he asked wishing to be sure hehad understood me."Yes," I replied.He put his twig in position, and in a few seconds it turnedin the direction of the ground. Then he drove down a stick,marked out a circle, and the next day he came with two men and aderrick, and began to dig my well.When they had gone down twenty-five feet they found water,and when they had progressed a few feet deeper they began to beafraid of drowning. I thought they ought to go deeper, but thewell-digger said that they could not dig without first takingout the water, and that the water came in as fast as theybailed it out, and he asked me to put it to myself and tell himhow they could dig it deeper. I put the question to myself, butcould find no answer. I also laid the matter before somespecialists, and it was generally agreed that if water came in asfast as it was taken out, nothing more could be desired. Thewell was, therefore, pronounced deep enough. It was lined withgreat tiles, nearly a yard in diameter, and my well-digger, aftercongratulating me on finding water so easily, bade me good-by anddeparted with his men and his derrick.On the other side of the wall which bounded my grounds, andnear which my well had been dug, there ran a country lane,leading nowhere in particular, which seemed to be there for thepurpose of allowing people to pass my house, who might otherwisebe obliged to stop.Along this lane my neighbors would pass, and often strangersdrove by, and as my well could easily be seen over the low stonewall, its construction had excited a great deal of interest.Some of the people who drove by were summer folks from the city,and I am sure, from remarks I overheard, that it was thought avery queer thing to dig for water. Of course they must haveknown that people used to do this in the olden times, even as farback as the time of Jacob and Rebecca, but the expressions ofsome of their faces indicated that they remembered that this wasthe nineteenth century.My neighbors, however, were all rural people, and much moreintelligent in regard to water-supplies. One of them, PhineasColwell by name, took a more lively interest in myoperations than did any one else. He was a man of about fiftyyears of age, who had been a soldier. This fact was kept alivein the minds of his associates by his dress, a part of which wasalways military. If he did not wear an old fatigue-jacket withbrass buttons, he wore his blue trousers, or, perhaps, awaistcoat that belonged to his uniform, and if he wore none ofthese, his military hat would appear upon his head. I think hemust also have been a sailor, judging from the little gold ringsin his ears. But when I first knew him he was a carpenter, whodid mason-work whenever any of the neighbors had any jobs of thesort. He also worked in gardens by the day, and had told me thathe understood the care of horses and was a very good driver. Hesometimes worked on farms, especially at harvest-time, and I knowhe could paint, for he once showed me a fence which he said hehad painted. I frequently saw him, because he always seemed tobe either going to his work or coming from it. In fact, heappeared to consider actual labor in the light of a bad habitwhich he wished to conceal, and which he was continuallyendeavoring to reform.Phineas walked along our lane at least once a day, andwhenever he saw me he told me something about the well. He didnot approve of the place I had selected for it. If he had beendigging a well he would have put it in a very different place.When I had talked with him for some time and explained why I hadchosen this spot, he would say that perhaps I was right, andbegin to talk of something else. But the next time I saw him hewould again assert that if he had been digging that well he wouldnot have put it there.About a quarter of a mile from my house, at a turn of thelane, lived Mrs. Betty Perch. She was a widow with about twelvechildren. A few of these were her own, and the others she hadinherited from two sisters who had married and died, and whosehusbands, having proved their disloyalty by marrying again, werenot allowed by the indignant Mrs. Perch to resume possession oftheir offspring. The casual observer might have supposed thenumber of these children to be very great,--fifteen or perhapseven twenty,--for if he happened to see a group of them on thedoor-step, he would see a lot more if he looked into the littlegarden; and under some cedar-trees at the back of the house therewere always some of them on fine days. But perhaps they soughtto increase their apparent number, and ran from one place toanother to be ready to meet observation, like the famous clownGrimaldi, who used to go through his performances at one Londontheatre, and then dash off in his paint and motley to another, sothat perambulating theatre-going men might imagine that therewere two greatest clowns in the world.When Mrs. Perch had time she sewed for the neighbors, and,whether she had time or not, she was always ready to supply themwith news. From the moment she heard I was going to dig a wellshe took a vital interest in it. Her own water-supply wasunsatisfactory, as she depended upon a little spring whichsometimes dried up in summer, and should my well turn out to be agood one, she knew I would not object to her sending the childrenfor pails of water on occasions."It will be fun for them," she said, "and if your waterreally is good it will often come in very well for me. Mr.Colwell tells me," she continued, "that you put your well in thewrong place. He is a practical man and knows all about wells,and I do hope that for your sake he may be wrong."My neighbors were generally pessimists. Country people areproverbially prudent, and pessimism is prudence. We feel safewhen we doubt the success of another, because if he shouldsucceed we can say we were glad we were mistaken, and so stepfrom a position of good judgment to one of generous dispositionwithout feeling that we have changed our plane of merit. But theoptimist often gets himself into terrible scrapes, for if he iswrong he cannot say he is glad of it.But, whatever else he may be, a pessimist is depressing, andit was, therefore, a great pleasure to me to have a friend whowas an out-and-out optimist. In fact, he might be called aworking optimist. He lived about six miles from my house, andhad a hobby, which was natural phenomena. He was always on thelookout for that sort of thing, and when he found it he wouldstudy its nature and effect. He was a man in the maturity ofyouth, and if the estate on which he lived had not belonged tohis mother, he would have spent much time and money ininvestigating its natural phenomena. He often drove over to seeme, and always told me how glad he would be if he had anopportunity of digging a well."I have the wildest desire," he said, "to know what is in theearth under our place, and if it should so happen in the courseof time that the limits of earthly existence should be reachedby--I mean if the estate should come into my hands--I wouldgo down, down, down, until I had found out all that could bediscovered. To own a plug of earth four thousand miles long andonly to know what is on the surface of the upper end of it isunmanly. We might as well be grazing beasts."He was sorry that I was digging only for water, because wateris a very commonplace thing, but he was quite sure I would getit, and when my well was finished he was one of the first tocongratulate me."But if I had been in your place," said he, "with full rightto do as I pleased, I would not have let those men go away. Iwould have set them to work in some place where there would be nodanger of getting water,--at least, for a long time,--and thenyou would have found out what are the deeper treasures of yourland."Having finished my well, I now set about getting the waterinto my residence near by. I built a house over the well and putin it a little engine, and by means of a system of pipes, likethe arteries and veins of the human body, I proposed todistribute the water to the various desirable points in my house.The engine was the heart, which should start the circulation,which should keep it going, and which should send throbbingthrough every pipe the water which, if it were not our life, wasvery necessary to it.When all was ready we started the engine, and in a very shorttime we discovered that something was wrong. For fifteen ortwenty minutes water flowed into the tank at the top of thehouse, with a sound that was grander in the ears of my wife andmyself than the roar of Niagara, and then it stopped.Investigation proved that the flow had stopped because therewas no more water in the well.It is needless to detail the examinations, investigations,and the multitude of counsels and opinions with which our mindswere filled for the next few days. It was plain to see thatalthough this well was fully able to meet the demands of a hand-pump or of bailing buckets, the water did not flow into it asfast as it could be pumped out by an engine. Therefore, for thepurposes of supplying the circulation of my domestic watersystem, the well was declared a failure.My non-success was much talked about in the neighborhood, andwe received a great deal of sympathy and condolence. PhineasColwell was not surprised at the outcome of the affair. He hadsaid that the well had been put in the wrong place. Mrs. Bettywas not only surprised, but disgusted."It is all very well for you," she said, "who could afford tobuy water if it was necessary, but it is very different with thewidow and the orphan. If I had not supposed you were going tohave a real well, I would have had my spring cleaned out anddeepened. I could have had it done in the early summer, but itis of no use now. The spring has dried up."She told a neighbor that she believed the digging of my wellhad dried up her spring, and that that was the way of this world,where the widow and the orphan were sure to come out at thelittle end.Of course I did not submit to defeat--at least, not without astruggle. I had a well, and if anything could be done to makethat well supply me with water, I was going to do it. Iconsulted specialists, and, after careful consideration of thematter, they agreed that it would be unadvisable for me toattempt to deepen my present well, as there was reason to supposethere was very little water in the place where I had dug it, andthat the very best thing I could do would be to try a drivenwell. As I had already excavated about thirty feet, that was somuch gain to me, and if I should have a six-inch pipe put into mypresent well and then driven down and down until it came to aplace where there was plenty of water, I would have all I wanted.How far down the pipe would have to be driven, of course they didnot know, but they all agreed that if I drove deep enough I wouldget all the water I wanted. This was the only kind of a well,they said, which one could sink as deep as he pleased withoutbeing interfered with by the water at the bottom. My wife and Ithen considered the matter, and ultimately decided that it wouldbe a waste of the money which we had already spent upon theengine, the pipes, and the little house, and, as there wasnothing else to be done but to drive a well, we would have a welldriven.Of course we were both very sorry that the work must be begunagain, but I was especially dissatisfied, for the weather wasgetting cold, there was already snow upon the ground, and I wastold that work could not be carried on in winter weather. I lostno time, however, in making a contract with a well-driver, whoassured me that as soon as the working season should open, whichprobably would be very early in the spring, he would come to myplace and begin to drive my well.The season did open, and so did the pea-blossoms, and thepods actually began to fill before I saw that well-driveragain. I had had a good deal of correspondence with him in themeantime, urging him to prompt action, but he always had somegood reason for delay. (I found out afterwards that he was busyfulfilling a contract made before mine, in which he promised todrive a well as soon as the season should open.)At last--it was early in the summer--he came with his derricks, asteam-engine, a trip-hammer, and a lot of men. They took off theroof of my house, removed the engine, and set to work.For many a long day, and I am sorry to say for many a longernight, that trip-hammer hammered and banged. On the next dayafter the night-work began, one of my neighbors came to me toknow what they did that for. I told him they were anxious to getthrough."Get through what?" said he. "The earth? If they do that,and your six-inch pipe comes out in a Chinaman's back yard, hewill sue you for damages."When the pipe had been driven through the soft stratum underthe old well, and began to reach firmer ground, the pounding andshaking of the earth became worse and worse. My wife was obligedto leave home with our child."If he is to do without both water and sleep," said she, "hecannot long survive." And I agreed with her.She departed for a pleasant summer resort where her marriedsister with her child was staying, and from week to week Ireceived very pleasant letters from her, telling me of the charmsof the place, and dwelling particularly upon the abundance ofcool spring water with which the house was supplied.While this terrible pounding was going on I heard variousreports of its effect upon my neighbors. One of them, anagriculturist, with whom I had always been on the best of terms,came with a clouded brow."When I first felt those shakes," he said, "I thought theywere the effects of seismic disturbances, and I did not mind, butwhen I found it was your well I thought I ought to come over tospeak about it. I do not object to the shaking of my barn,because my man tells me the continual jolting is thrashing outthe oats and wheat, but I do not like to have all my apples andpears shaken off my trees. And then," said he, "I have a latebrood of chickens, and they cannot walk, because every time theytry to make a step they are jolted into the air about a foot.And again, we have had to give up having soup. We like soup, butwe do not care to have it spout up like a fountain whenever thathammer comes down."I was grieved to trouble this friend, and I asked him what Ishould do. "Do you want me to stop the work on the well?" said I."Oh, no," said he, heartily. "Go on with the work. You musthave water, and we will try to stand the bumping. I dare say itis good for dyspepsia, and the cows are getting used to havingthe grass jammed up against their noses. Go ahead; we can standit in the daytime, but if you could stop the night-work we wouldbe very glad. Some people may think it a well-spring of pleasureto be bounced out of bed, but I don't."Mrs. Perch came to me with a face like a squeezed lemon, andasked me if I could lend her five nails."What sort? " said I."The kind you nail clapboards on with," said she. "There isone of them been shook entirely off my house by your well. I amin hopes that before the rest are all shook off I shall get insome money that is owing me and can afford to buy nails formyself."I stopped the night-work, but this was all I could do forthese neighbors.My optimist friend was delighted when he heard of my drivenwell. He lived so far away that he and his mother were notdisturbed by the jarring of the ground. Now he was sure thatsome of the internal secrets of the earth would be laid bare, andhe rode or drove over every day to see what we were getting outof the well. I know that he was afraid we would soon get water,but was too kind-hearted to say so.One day the pipe refused to go deeper. No matter how hard itwas struck, it bounced up again. When some of the substance ithad struck was brought up it looked like French chalk, and myoptimist eagerly examined it."A French-chalk mine," said he, "would not be a bad thing,but I hoped that you had struck a bed of mineral gutta-percha.That would be a grand find."But the chalk-bed was at last passed, and we began again tobring up nothing but common earth."I suppose," said my optimist to me, one morning, "that youmust soon come to water, and if you do I hope it will be hotwater.""Hot water!" I exclaimed. "I do not want that.""Oh, yes, you would, if you had thought about it as much as Ihave," he replied. "I lay awake for hours last night, thinkingwhat would happen if you struck hot water. In the first place,it would be absolutely pure, because, even if it werepossible for germs and bacilli to get down so deep, they would beboiled before you got them, and then you could cool that waterfor drinking. When fresh it would be already heated for cookingand hot baths. And then--just think of it!--you could introducethe hot-water system of heating into your house, and there wouldbe the hot water always ready. But the great thing would be yourgarden. Think of the refuse hot water circulating in pipes upand down and under all your beds! That garden would bloom in thewinter as others do in the summer; at least, you could begin tohave Lima-beans and tomatoes as soon as the frost was out of theair."I laughed. "It would take a lot of pumping," I said, "to doall that with the hot water.""Oh, I forgot to say," he cried, with sparkling eyes, "that Ido not believe you would ever have any more pumping to do. Youhave now gone down so far that I am sure whatever you find willforce itself up. It will spout high into the air or through allyour pipes, and run always."Phineas Colwell was by when this was said, and he must havegone down to Mrs. Betty Perch's house to talk it over with her,for in the afternoon she came to see me."I understand," said she, "that you are trying to get hotwater out of your well, and that there is likely to be a lot morethan you need, so that it will run down by the side of the road.I just want to say that if a stream of hot water comes down pastmy house some of the children will be bound to get into it and bescalded to death, and I came to say that if that well isgoing to squirt b'iling water I'd like to have notice so that Ican move, though where a widow with so many orphans is going tomove to nobody knows. Mr. Colwell says that if you had got himto tell you where to put that well there would have been nodanger of this sort of thing."The next day the optimist came to me, his face fairly blazingwith a new idea. "I rode over on purpose to urge you," he cried,"if you should strike hot water, not to stop there. Go on, and,by George! you may strike fire.""Heavens!" I cried."Oh, quite the opposite," said he. "But do not let us joke.I think that would be the grandest thing of this age. Think of afire well, with the flames shooting up perhaps a hundred feetinto the air!"I wish Phineas Colwell had not been there. As it was, heturned pale and sat down on the wall."You look astonished!" exclaimed the optimist, "but listen tome. You have not thought of this thing as I have. If you shouldstrike fire your fortune would be made. By a system ofreflectors you could light up the whole country. By means oftiles and pipes this region could be made tropical. You couldwarm all the houses in the neighborhood with hot air. And thenthe power you could generate--just think of it! Heat is power;the cost of power is the fuel. You could furnish power to allwho wanted it. You could fill this region with industries. Mydear sir, you must excuse my agitation, but if you should strikefire there is no limit to the possibilities of achievement.""But I want water," said I. "Fire would not take the placeof that.""Oh, water is a trifle," said he. "You could have pipes laidfrom town; it is only about two miles. But fire! Nobody has yetgone down deep enough for that. You have your future in yourhands."As I did not care to connect my future with fire, this ideadid not strike me very forcibly, but it struck Phineas Colwell.He did not say anything to me, but after I had gone he went tothe well-drivers."If you feel them pipes getting hot," he said to them, "Iwarn you to stop. I have been in countries where there arevolcanoes, and I know what they are. There's enough of them inthis world, and there's no need of making new ones."In the afternoon a wagoner, who happened to be passing,brought me a note from Mrs. Perch, very badly spelled, asking ifI would let one of my men bring her a pail of water, for shecould not think of coming herself or letting any of the childrencome near my place if spouting fires were expected.The well-driving had gone on and on, with intermissions onaccount of sickness in the families of the various workmen, untilit had reached the limit which I had fixed, and we had not foundwater in sufficient quantity, hot or cold, nor had we struckfire, or anything else worth having.The well-drivers and some specialists were of the opinionthat if I were to go ten, twenty, or perhaps a hundred feetdeeper, I would be very likely to get all the water I wanted.But, of course, they could not tell how deep they must go, forsome wells were over a thousand feet deep. I shook my head atthis. There seemed to be only one thing certain about thisdrilling business, and that was the expense. I declined to goany deeper."I think," a facetious neighbor said to me, "it would becheaper for you to buy a lot of Apollinaris water,--at wholesalerates, of course,--and let your men open so many bottles a dayand empty them into your tank. You would find that would paybetter in the long run."Phineas Colwell told me that when he had informed Mrs. Perchthat I was going to stop operations, she was in a dreadful stateof mind. After all she had undergone, she said, it was simplycruel to think of my stopping before I got water, and that afterhaving dried up her spring!This is what Phineas said she said, but when next I met hershe told me that he had declared that if I had put the well wherehe thought it ought to be, I should have been having all thewater I wanted before now.My optimist was dreadfully cast down when he heard that Iwould drive no deeper."I have been afraid of this," he said. "I have, been afraidof it. And if circumstances had so arranged themselves that Ishould have command of money, I should have been glad to assumethe expense of deeper explorations. I have been thinking a greatdeal about the matter, and I feel quite sure that even if you didnot get water or anything else that might prove of value to you,it would be a great advantage to have a pipe sunk into the earthto the depth of, say, one thousand feet.""What possible advantage could that be?" I asked."I will tell you," he said. "You would then have one ofthe grandest opportunities ever offered to man of constructing agravity-engine. This would be an engine which would be of noexpense at all to run. It would need no fuel. Gravity would bethe power. It would work a pump splendidly. You could start itwhen you liked and stop it when you liked.""Pump!" said I. "What is the good of a pump without water?""Oh, of course you would have to have water," he answered."But, no matter how you get it, you will have to pump it up toyour tank so as to make it circulate over your house. Now, mygravity-pump would do this beautifully. You see, the pump wouldbe arranged with cog-wheels and all that sort of thing, and thepower would be supplied by a weight, which would be a cylinder oflead or iron, fastened to a rope and run down inside your pipe.Just think of it! It would run down a thousand feet, and whereis there anything worked by weight that has such a fall as that?"I laughed. "That is all very well," said I. "But how aboutthe power required to wind that weight up again when it got tothe bottom? I should have to have an engine to do that.""Oh, no," said he. "I have planned the thing better thanthat. You see, the greater the weight the greater the power andthe velocity. Now, if you take a solid cylinder of lead aboutfour inches in diameter, so that it would slip easily down yourpipe,--you might grease it, for that matter,--and twenty feet inlength, it would be an enormous weight, and in slowly descendingfor about an hour a day--for that would be long enough for yourpumping--and going down a thousand feet, it would run yourengine for a year. Now, then, at the end of the year you couldnot expect to haul that weight up again. You would have atrigger arrangement which would detach it from the rope when itgot to the bottom. Then you would wind up your rope,--a mancould do that in a short time,--and you would attach anothercylinder of lead, and that would run your engine for anotheryear, minus a few days, because it would only go down ninehundred and eighty feet. The next year you would put on anothercylinder, and so on. I have not worked out the figures exactly,but I think that in this way your engine would run for thirtyyears before the pipe became entirely filled with cylinders.That would be probably as long as you would care to have waterforced into the house.""Yes"' said I, "I think that is likely."He saw that his scheme did not strike me favorably. Suddenlya light flashed across his face."I tell you what you can do with your pipe," he said, "justas it is. You can set up a clock over it which would run forforty years without winding."I smiled, and he turned sadly away to his horse; but he hadnot ridden ten yards before he came back and called to me overthe wall."If the earth at the bottom of your pipe should ever yield topressure and give way, and if water or gas, or--anything, shouldbe squirted out of it, I beg you will let me know as soon aspossible."I promised to do so.When the pounding was at an end my wife and child came home.But the season continued dry, and even their presence could notcounteract the feeling of aridity which seemed to permeateeverything which belonged to us, material or immaterial. We hada great deal of commiseration from our neighbors. I think evenMrs. Betty Perch began to pity us a little, for her spring hadbegun to trickle again in a small way, and she sent word to methat if we were really in need of water she would be willing todivide with us. Phineas Colwell was sorry for us, of course, buthe could not help feeling and saying that if I had consulted himthe misfortune would have been prevented.It was late in the summer when my wife returned, and when shemade her first visit of inspection to the grounds and gardens,her eyes, of course, fell upon the unfinished well. She wasshocked."I never saw such a scene of wreckage," she said. "It lookslike a Western town after a cyclone. I think the best thing youcan do is to have this dreadful litter cleared up, the groundsmoothed and raked, the wall mended, and the roof put back onthat little house, and then if we can make anybody believe it isan ice-house, so much the better."This was good advice, and I sent for a man to put thevicinity of the well in order and give it the air of neatnesswhich characterizes the rest of our home.The man who came was named Mr. Barnet. He was acontemplative fellow with a pipe in his mouth. After havingworked at the place for half a day he sent for me and said:"I'll tell you what I would do if I was in your place. I'dput that pump-house in order, and I'd set up the engine, and putthe pump down into that thirty-foot well you first dug, and I'dpump water into my house."I looked at him in amazement."There's lots of water in that well," he continued, "and ifthere's that much now in this drought, you will surely have everso much more when the weather isn't so dry. I have measured thewater, and I know."I could not understand him. It seemed to me that he was talkingwildly. He filled his pipe and lighted it and sat upon the wall."Now," said he, after he had taken a few puffs, "I'll tellyou where the trouble's been with your well. People are alwaysin too big a hurry in this world about all sorts of things aswell as wells. I am a well-digger and I know all about them. Weknow if there is any water in the ground it will always find itsway to the deepest hole there is, and we dig a well so as to giveit a deep hole to go to in the place where we want it. But youcan't expect the water to come to that hole just the very dayit's finished. Of course you will get some, because it's rightthere in the neighborhood, but there is always a lot more thatwill come if you give it time. It's got to make little channelsand passages for itself, and of course it takes time to do that.It's like settling up a new country. Only a few pioneers come atfirst, and you have to wait for the population to flow in. Thisbeing a dry season, and the water in the ground a little sluggishon that account, it was a good while finding out where your wellwas. If I had happened along when you was talking about a well,I think I should have said to you that I knew a proverb whichwould about fit your case, and that is: `Let well enoughalone.'"I felt like taking this good man by the hand, but I did not. Ionly told him to go ahead and do everything that was proper.The next morning, as I was going to the well, I saw PhineasColwell coming down the lane and Mrs. Betty Perch coming up it.I did not wish them to question me, so I stepped behind somebushes. When they met they stopped."Upon my word!" exclaimed Mrs. Betty, "if he isn't going towork again on that everlasting well! If he's got so much moneyhe don't know what to do with it, I could tell him that there'speople in this world, and not far away either, who would be thebetter for some of it. It's a sin and a shame and anabomination. Do you believe, Mr. Colwell, that there is theleast chance in the world of his ever getting water enough out ofthat well to shave himself with?""Mrs. Perch," said Phineas, "it ain't no use talking aboutthat well. It ain't no use, and it never can be no use, becauseit's in the wrong place. If he ever pumps water out of that wellinto his house I'll do--""What will you do?" asked Mr. Barnet, who just then appearedfrom the recesses of the engine-house."I'll do anything on this earth that you choose to name,"said Phineas. "I am safe, whatever it is.""Well, then," said Mr. Barnet, knocking the ashes from hispipe preparatory to filling it again, "will you marry Mrs.Perch?"Phineas laughed. "Yes," he said. "I promised I would doanything, and I'll promise that.""A slim chance for me," said Mrs. Betty, "even if I'd haveyou." And she marched on with her nose in the air.When Mr. Barnet got fairly to work with his derrick, hismen, and his buckets, he found that there was a good deal more todo than he had expected. The well-drivers had injured theoriginal well by breaking some of the tiles which lined it, andthese had to be taken out and others put in, and in the course ofthis work other improvements suggested themselves and were made.Several times operations were delayed by sickness in the familyof Mr. Barnet, and also in the families of his workmen, but stillthe work went on in a very fair manner, although much more slowlythan had been supposed by any one. But in the course of time--Iwill not say how much time--the work was finished, the engine wasin its place, and it pumped water into my house, and every daysince then it has pumped all the water we need, pure, cold, anddelicious.Knowing the promise Phineas Colwell had made, and feelingdesirous of having everything which concerned my well settled andfinished, I went to look for him to remind him of his duty towardMrs. Perch, but I could not find that naval and militarymechanical agriculturist. He had gone away to take a job or acontract,--I could not discover which,--and he has not sinceappeared in our neighborhood. Mrs. Perch is very severe on meabout this."There's plenty of bad things come out of that well," shesaid, "but I never thought anything bad enough would come out ofit to make Mr. Colwell go away and leave me to keep on being awidow with all them orphans."

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