whiskey distributed freely about the table, which, in part, they
surrounded, had, in the Indian phrase, more tongues than brains, and
were sufficiently aroused by their potations to enter readily into any
mischief. Some were smoking with all the industrious perseverance of the
Hollander; others shouted forth songs in honor of the bottle, and with
all the fervor and ferment of Bacchanalian novitiates; and not a few,
congregating about the immediate person of the pedler, assailed his ears
with threats sufficiently pregnant with tangible illustration to make
him understand and acknowledge, by repeated starts and wincings, the
awkward and uncomfortable predicament in which he stood. At length, the
various disputants for justice, finding it difficult, if not impossible,
severally, to command that attention which they conceived they merited,
resolved themselves into something like a committee of the whole, and
proceeded to the settlement of their controversy, and the pedler's fate,
in a manner more suited to the importance of the occasion. Having
procured that attention which was admitted to be the great object, more
by the strength of his lungs than his argument, one of the company, who
was dignified by the title of colonel, spoke out for the rest.

"I say, boys--'tisn't of any use, I reckon, for everybody to speak about
what everybody knows. One speaker's quite enough in this here matter
before us. Here's none of us that sha'n't something to say agin this
pedler, and the doings of the grand scoundrel in and about these parts,
for a matter going on now about three years. Why, everybody knows him,
big and little; and his reputation is so now, that the very boys take
his name to frighten away the crows with. Now, one person can jist as
well make a plain statement as another. I know, of my own score, there's
not one of my neighbors for ten miles round, that can't tell all about
the rotten prints he put off upon my old woman; and I know myself of all
the tricks he's played at odd times, more than a dozen, upon 'Squire