CHAPTER XV.


Rosville was a county town. The courts were held there, and its
society was adorned with several lawyers of note who had law students,
which fact was to the lawyers' daughters the most agreeable feature
of their fathers' profession. It had a weekly market day and an
annual cattle show. I saw a turnout of whips and wagons about the
hitching-posts round the green of a Tuesday the year through, and
going to and from school met men with a bovine smell. Caucuses were
prevalent, and occasionally a State Convention was held, when Rosville
paid honor to some political hero of the day with banners and brass
bands. It was a favorite spot for the rustication of naughty boys from
Harvard or Yale. Dr. Price had one or two at present who boarded in
his house so as to be immediately under his purblind eyes, and who
took Greek and Latin at the Academy.

Social feuds raged in the Academy coteries between the collegians
and the natives on account of the superior success of the former in
flirtation. The latter were not consoled by their experience that no
flirtation lasted beyond the period of rustication. Dr. Price usually
had several young men fitting for college also, which fact added more
piquancy to the provincial society. In the summer riding parties were
fashionable, and in the winter county balls and cotillion parties;
a professor came down from Boston at this season to set up a dancing
school, which was always well attended.

The secular concerns of life engaged the greatest share of the