stint, and to their liking,) loomed out through a gray mist that
tipped the clouds with a pale fringe. And the clean green shutters
of the bright white houses, and the neatly arranged gardens, with
their picket fences, ranging along both sides of the street, and the
flowers that were giving out their perfumes to the night breeze,
were all blending in a panorama of exquisite softness.

The major plumed himself not a little on his popularity with the
town's people, who made his departures and arrivals no common
events. Nor was his admiration of himself one whit less than that so
common with some others I have in view at this moment, and who
follow the profession of arms.

And now, news of his approach having got spread abroad, he had
scarcely entered the outskirts of the town when little Barnstable,
hatless and shoeless, came running to meet him, cheering, clambering
upon his wagon, and making such other demonstrations of welcome as
satisfied the major that the town had waited his return with no
little anxiety, though it annoyed old Battle exceedingly, for he had
great difficulty in drawing the load over the sand. Seeing the
distress the animal was in, two mischievous urchins fell upon him,
seized him by the halter, and, after throwing it over their
shoulders, were joined by some two dozen more, who ran ahead
dragging him by the mouth, while three others plied his belly with
switches. The major, in the meantime, continued to contemplate the
fortune there was in a pig so learned, and who was now mingling his
loudest squeals with the cheers and bravos of the urchins, until the
very welkin rang with their echoes. We proceeded according to old
Battle's slow pace to what I shall for convenience sake call the
Independent Temperance Hotel, the guests of which were so alarmed at