tottered upon three legs. Being therefore sold at auction,--alas I what
a vicissitude for a chair that had figured in such high company!--our
venerable friend was knocked down to a certain Captain John Hull. This
old gentleman, on carefully examining the maimed chair, discovered that
its broken leg might be clamped with iron and made as serviceable as
ever."

"Here is the very leg that was broken!" exclaimed Charley, throwing
himself down on the floor to look at it. "And here are the iron clamps.
How well it was mended!"

When they had all sufficiently examined the broken leg, Grandfather told
them a story about Captain John Hull and the Pine-tree Shillings.

The Captain John Hull aforesaid was the mint-master of Massachusetts,
and coined all the money that was made there. This was a new line of
business, for, in the earlier days of the colony, the current coinage
consisted of gold and silver money of England, Portugal, and Spain.
These coins being scarce, the people were often forced to barter their
commodities instead of selling them.

For instance, if a man wanted to buy a coat, he perhaps exchanged a
bear-skin for it. If he wished for a barrel of molasses, he might
purchase it with a pile of pine boards. Musket-bullets were used instead
of farthings. The Indians had a sort of money, called wampum, which was
made of clam-shells; and this strange sort of specie was likewise taken
in payment of debts by the English settlers. Bank-bills had never been
heard of. There was not money enough of any kind, in many parts of the
country, to pay the salaries of the ministers; so that they sometimes
had to take quintals of fish, bushels of corn, or cords of wood, instead