cause us to sit in the stocks, for an ensample.

But if so mild an excursion involve so dire a risk, what must be the
desperation of this horseman who is coming at a thundering gallop
along the county road from Pittsfield? His horse is in a foaming
sweat, the strained nostrils are filled with blood and the congested
eyes protrude as if they would leap from their sockets to be at their
goal.

It is Squire Woodbridge's two story red house before which the horseman
pulls rein, and leaving his steed with hanging head and trembling knees
and laboring sides, drags his own stiffened limbs up the walk and enters
the house. Almost instantly Squire Woodbridge himself, issues from the
door, dressed for church in a fine black coat, waistcoat, and
knee-breeches, white silk stockings, a three-cornered black hat and
silver buckles on his shoes, but in his hand instead of a Bible, a
musket. As he steps out, the door of a house further east opens also,
and another man similarly dressed, with brown woolen stockings, steps
forth with a gun in his hand also. He seems to have interpreted the
meaning of the horseman's message. This is Deacon Nash. Beckoning him
to follow, Squire Woodbridge steps out to the edge of the green, raises
his musket to his shoulder and discharges it into the air. Deacon Nash
coming up a moment later also raises and fires his gun, and e'er the
last echoes have reverberated from the mountains, Squire Edwards,
musket in hand, throws open his store door and stepping out on the
porch, fires the third gun.

A moment ago hundreds of faces were smiling, hundreds of eyes were
bright, hundreds of cheeks were flushed. Now there is not a single
smile or a trace of brightness, or a bit of color on a face in the