ever trod shoe-leather, and it was Providunce a-speakin' to me when
she--"

The team passed away into the gloomy mouth of the Smyrna bridge.




III


Once on a time when the Wixon boy put Paris-green in the Trufants'
well, because the oldest Trufant girl had given him the mitten, Marm
Gossip gabbled in Smyrna until flecks of foam gathered in the corners
of her mouth.

But when Cap'n Aaron Sproul, late of the deep sea, so promptly, so
masterfully married Col. Gideon Ward's sister--after the irascible
Colonel had driven every other suitor away from that patient
lady--and then gave the Colonel his "everlasting comeuppance," and
settled down in Smyrna as boss of the Ward household, that event
nearly wore Gossip's tongue into ribbons.

"I see'd it from a distance--the part that happened in front of the
toll-house," said Old Man Jordan. "Now, all of ye know that Kun'l
Gid most gin'ly cal'lates to eat up folks that says 'Boo' to him,
and pick his teeth with slivers of their bones. But talk about your
r'yal Peeruvian ragin' lions--of wherever they come from--why, that
Cap'n Sproul could back a 'Rabian caterwouser right off'm
Caterwouser Township! I couldn't hear what was said, but I see Kun'l