midday
No three days of all the slow trail had been harder to endure than these . `` Play for them , Jed , '' counseled Caleb Price , when that hardy youth , leaving his shrunken herd , came in for his lunch that day at the ford . `` Yes , but keep that fiddle in the shade , Jed , or the sun certainly will pop it open . '' Jed 's mother , her apron full of broken bits of sagebrush , turned to see that her admonishment was heeded before she began her midday coffee fire . As for Jed himself , with a wide grin he crouched down at the side of the wagon and leaned against a wheel as he struck up a lively air , roaring joyously to his accompaniment : _ Git out o ' the way , old Dan Tucker , You 're too late to git yore supper ! _ Unmindful of the sullen apathy of men and women , the wailing of children stifling under the wagon tops , the moans of the sick and wounded in their ghastly discomfort , Jed sang with his cracked lips as he swung from one jig to the next , the voice of the violin reaching all the wagons of the shortened train . `` Choose yore pardners ! ''