Congregational boarding-houses. We've got a heap of Yankees in the town,
and they all flock together and pray together. I reckon you'd ruther go
to Miss Crane's nor anywhere."

Forthwith to Miss Crane's Eliphalet went. And that lady, being a Greek
herself, knew a Greek when she saw one. The kind-hearted Barbo lingered
in the gathering darkness to witness the game which ensued, a game dear
to all New Englanders, comical to Barbo. The two contestants calculated.
Barbo reckoned, and put his money on his new-found fellow-clerk.
Eliphalet, indeed, never showed to better advantage. The shyness he had
used with the Colonel, and the taciturnity practised on his
fellow-clerks, he slipped off like coat and waistcoat for the battle. The
scene was in the front yard of the third house in Dorcas Row. Everybody
knows where Dorcas Row was. Miss Crane, tall, with all the severity of
side curls and bombazine, stood like a stone lioness at the gate. In the
background, by the steps, the boarders sat, an interested group.
Eliphalet girded up his loins, and sharpened his nasal twang to cope with
hers. The preliminary sparring was an exchange of compliments, and
deceived neither party. It seemed rather to heighten mutual respect.

"You be from Willesden, eh?" said Crane. "I calculate you know the
Salters."

If the truth were known, this evidence of an apparent omniscience rather
staggered Eliphalet. But training stood by him, and he showed no dismay.
Yes, he knew the Salters, and had drawed many a load out of Hiram
Salters' wood-lot to help pay for his schooling.

"Let me see," said Miss Crane, innocently; "who was it one of them
Salters girls married, and lived across the way from the meetin'-house?"