'Squire Van Tassel, as this man was universally termed, eyed us keenly as
we entered, no doubt with a view to ascertain if we were borrowers. I
might possibly have passed for one of that character, for I aimed at
looking serious and thoughtful; but I would defy any man to mistake Moses
for one who came on such an errand. He looked more like a messenger sent
by the Father of Sin, to demand the payment of a certain bond that had
been signed in blood, and of which the fatal pay-day had at length
arrived. I had to give the skirt of his coat a pull, in order to recall
him to our agreement, else I do think the first salutation received by the
attorney, would have been a broadside in anything but words. The hint
succeeded, and Marble permitted our host to open the communications.

Squire Van Tassel had a very miserly exterior. He even looked ill fed;
though doubtless this appearance was more a consequence of habit of body,
than of short-feeding. He wore spectacles with black rims, and had the
common practice of looking over them at objects at a distance, which gave
him an air still more watchful than that which he imbibed from character.
His stature was small, and his years about sixty, an age when the
accumulation of money begins to bring as much pain as pleasure; for it is
a period of life when men cannot fail to see the termination of their
earthly schemes. Of all the passions, however, avarice is notoriously that
which the latest loosens its hold on the human heart.

"Your servant, gentlemen," commenced the attorney, in a manner that was
civil enough; "your servant; I beg you to help yourselves to chairs." We
all three took seats, at this invitation. "A pleasant evening," eyeing us
still more keenly over his glasses, "and weather that is good for the
crops. If the wars continue much longer in Europe," another look over the
glasses, "we shall sell all the substance out of our lands, in order to
send the belligerents wheat. I begin to look on real estate security as