Chapter 18

"Come hither, neighbor Sea-coal--God hath blessed you with a good name:
to be a well-favored man is the gift of fortune; but to write and read
comes by Nature."

Much Ado about Nothing.

It has already been said, that the hour at which the action of the tale
must re-commence, was early morning. The usual coolness of night, in a
country extensively covered with wood, had passed, and the warmth of a
summer morning, in that low latitude, was causing the streaks of light
vapor, that floated about the meadows, to rise above the trees. The
feathery patches united to form a cloud that sailed away towards the
summit of a distant mountain, which appeared to be a common rendezvous for
all the mists that had been generated by the past hours of darkness.

Though the burnished sky announced his near approach, the sun was not yet
visible. Notwithstanding the earliness of the hour, a man was already
mounting a little ascent in the road, at no great distance from the
southern entrance of the hamlet, and at a point where he could command a
view of all the objects described in the preceding chapter. A musket
thrown across his left shoulder, with the horn and pouch at his sides,
together with the little wallet at his back, proclaimed him one who had
either been engaged in a hunt, or in some short expedition of even a less
peaceable character. His dress was of the usual material and fashion of a
countryman of the age and colony, though a short broadsword, that was
thrust through a wampum belt which girded his body, might have attracted
observation. In all other respects, he had the air of an inhabitant of the
hamlet, who had found occasion to quit his abode on some affair of
pleasure or of duty, that had made no very serious demand on his time.

Whether native or stranger, few ever passed the hillock named, without
pausing to gaze at the quiet loveliness of the cluster of houses that lay
in full view from its summit. The individual mentioned loitered as usual,
but, instead of following the line of the path, his eye rather sought some
object in the direction of the fields. Moving leisurely to the nearest
fence, he threw down the upper rails of a pair of bars, and beckoned to a
horseman, who was picking his way across a broken bit of pasture land, to
enter the highway by the passage he had opened.

"Put the spur smartly into the pacer's flank," said he who had done this
act of civility, observing that the other hesitated to urge his beast
across the irregular and somewhat scattered pile; "my word for it, the
jade goes over them all, without touching with more than three of her four
feet. Fie, doctor! there is never a cow in the Wish-Ton-Wish, but it would
take the leap to be in the first at