and we were constantly in dread of having five
or six not too cleanly strangers sleeping in the
same room.

Charley was thoroughly disgusted with this
mode of living, as he had always been accustomed
to the best of everything, and did not relish sitting
down to dinner with a very ruffianly-looking
crowd, though I did not mind them, as I found by
experience that, though poor and rough, they were
honest and upright.

After dinner, which consisted of a number of
small pieces of bacon, hardly a mouthful apiece,
I went to look for my hat, but found it gone, and
a very shabby-looking article left in its place.
Remembering the old days at Avondale, when
Charley used to run off with my new hats and
leave his old ones for me to take, I had no hesita-
tion on this occasion in appropriating his. How-
ever, I went down to the village and bought a
new one. This made Charley and myself very
careful indeed about hanging up our hats when we
went in to meals, and we usually brought them up
to our room.

I remembered that a former West Point neigh-
bour, Mr. Read, had gone to live at Birmingham,
and we went and hunted him up. He was very
glad to see us, and promised to introduce us to
Colonel Powell, the pioneer of Birmingham, a
wealthy and prominent citizen, to whom the
original development of the coalfields was due.

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