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As soon as the company, described in the preceding chapter, had
all retired from the room, Brush, bidding Bart to rake up the fire
and go to bed, proceeded to lock all the outer doors of the house,
muttering to himself as he did so, “It can't be as Chandler fears,
I think, about this fellow's going out to blab to-night; but as this
will put an end to the possibillity of his doing it, I may as well
make all fast, and then there will be no chance for blame for
suffering him to remain in the room.”

So saying, and putting the different keys in his pocket, he at
once disappeared, on his way to his own apartment. When the
sound of his retiring footsteps had ceased to be heard, Bart, who
had lingered in the room, suddenly changed his sleepy, abject
appearance for a prompt, decisive look and an erect attitude.

“Two ideas above a jackass! — two ideas above a jackass,
eh?” he said, and slowly repeated, as with flashing eyes he
nodded significantly in the direction his master had taken. “You
may yet find out, Squire Brush, that my ears aint sich a disput
sight longer than yourn, arter all.”

With this he blew out the last remaining light, and groped his
way to his own humble sleeping-room, in the low attic story of
the back kitchen. Here, however, he manifested no disposition
to go to bed, but sitting down upon the side of his miserable pallet,
he remained motionless and silent for fifteen or twenty minutes,
when he began to soliloquize: “Jackass! — sleepy devil! — not
wit enough to see what they are at in six weeks, eh? Barty
Burt, you are one of small fishes, it is true; but, for all that, you
needn't be walloped about at this rate, and bamboozled, and
swallowed entirely up by the big ones of this court-and-king party.
You know enough to take care of yourself; yes, and at the same
time, you can be doing something towards paying these gentry
for the beautiful compliments you have had from them to-night,
and at other times. The fact is, Bart, you are a rebel now —
honestly one of them — you feel it in you, and you may as well
let it out. So here goes for their meeting, if it is to be found, if
I am hanged for it.”

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Having, in this whimsical manner, made a sort of manifesto of
his principles and intentions, as if to give them, with himself, a
more fixed and definite character, he now rose, buttoned up his
jacket, carefully raised the window of his room, let himself down
to the roof of a shed beneath it, and from that descended to the
ground, with the easy and rapid motions of a squirrel engaged in
nut-gathering. Here he cast a furtive glance around him, and
paused some moments, in apparent hesitation, respecting the
course to be taken to find those of whom he was in quest. Soon,
however, appearing to come to a determination, he struck out
into the main street, and, with a quick step, proceeded on, perhaps
a furlong, when he suddenly stopped short, and exclaimed,
“Hold up, Bart. What did that sly judge say about searching
in folks' sleighs, for — what was that word now? — But never
mind, it meant guns. And what did the sheriff say about a dozen
flint-and-steel men having come? Put that and that together
now, Bart, and see if it don't mean that the only guns brought into
town to-night are packed away in the straw, in the bottom of the
sleighs of the court party understrappers? Let's go and mouse
round their stopping-place a little, Bart. Perhaps you'll get more
news to carry to the rebels,” he added, turning round and making
towards the tavern at which those in the interests of the loyalists
were known generally to put up.

On reaching the tavern, and finding all there still and dark, he
proceeded directly to the barn shed, and commenced a search,
which was soon rewarded by finding, in the different sleighs
about the place, twelve muskets, carefully concealed in hay or
blankets. With a low chuckle of delight at his discovery, Bart
took as many as he could conveniently carry at one load, and,
going with them into the barn, thrust them one by one into the
hay mow, under the girts and beams, so as effectually to conceal
them. He then returned for others, and continued his employment
till the whole were thus disposed of; when he left the place,
and resumed his walk to the northerly end of the village. After
pursuing his way through the street, and some distance down the
road beyond the village, he paused against a low, long log-house,
standing endwise to the road. This house was occupied by a
middle-aged, single man, known by the name of Tom Dunning,
though often called Ditter Dunning, and sometimes Der Ditter,
on account of his frequent use of these terms as prefixes to
his words and sentences, arising from a natural impediment of
speech. He was a hunter by profession, and passed most of his
time in the woods, or round the Connecticut in catching salmon,

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which, at that period, were found in the river in considerable
numbers, as far up as Bellows Falls. Though he mingled but
little in society, yet he was known to be well informed respecting
all the public movements of the times; and it was also believed
that he had enrolled himself among the far-famed band of Green
Mountain Boys, and often joined them in their operations against
the Yorkers, on the other side of the mountains. Very little,
however, was known about the man, except that he was a shrewd,
resolute fellow, extremely eccentric, and perfectly impenetrable
to all but the few in whom he confided.

Bart, from some remark he had overheard in the street, in the early
part of the evening, had been led to conclude that the company
he now sought were assembled at this house. And though he
was personally unacquainted with the owner, and knew nothing
of his principles, yet he was resolved to enter and trust to luck
to make his introduction, if the company were present, and, if
not, to rely on his own wit to discover whether it were safe to
unfold his errand.

As he was approaching the house, Dunning hastily emerged
from the door, and, advancing with a quick step, confronted him
in the path with an air which seemed to imply an expectation
that his business would be at once announced. Bart, who was
not to be discomposed by any thing of this kind, manifested no
hurry to name his errand, and seemed to prefer that the other
should be the first to break the silence.

“Ditter — seems to me I have seen you somewhere?” at length
said Dunning, inquiringly.

“Very likely. I have often been there,” replied Bart, with
the utmost gravity.

“Ditter — devil you have! And what did you — der — ditter—
find there, my foxy young friend?”

“Nothing that I was looking for.”

“Der — what was that?”

“The meeting.”

“Der — what meeting?”

“The one I'd like to go to, may be.”

“You are a bright pup; but — der — don't spit this way; it
might be der — ditter — dangerous business to me; for you must
have been eating razors to-night.”

“No, I haven't; don't love 'em. But you haven't yet told
me where the meeting is?”

“Ditter — look here, my little chap,” said Dunning, getting impatient
and vexed that he could not decide whether the other was

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a knave, simpleton, or neither — “ditter — look here; — der —
don't your folks want you? Hadn't you better run along now?”

“Reckon I shall, when you tell me where to go and not run
against snags.”

“Ditter well, der go back the way you come, about ditter as
far again as half way; der then, ditter turn to the ditter right,
then to the ditter left, then der — ditter — ditter — ditter — go
along! you'll get there before I can tell you.”

“In no sort of hurry; will wait till you get your mouth off;
may be it will shoot near the mark, arter all.”

“Ditter, dog, my cat, if I — der — don't begin to believe you are
considerable of a critter; and I've half a mind to risk you a
piece; so come into the house, and, der — let me take a squint at
your phiz in the light.”

Taking no exceptions to the character of the invitation, Bart
now followed the other into the house, and, sitting down on a
bench by the fire, began very unconcernedly to whistle, on a
low key, the tune of Yankee Doodle, which was then just beginning
to be considered a patriotic air. Dunning, in the mean time,
taking a seat in the opposite corner, commenced his proposed
scrutiny, which he continued, with one eye partly closed, and
with a certain dubious expression of countenance, for some moments,
when he observed,

“You are a ditter queer chicken, that's a fact. But I der find,
now that I know you, as the ditter divil did his pigs, by sight; I
know also the sort of folks you have been living amongst lately;
and der knowing all that, it's reasonable that I should be a snuffing
a little for the ditter smell of brimstone. So now, if you are a
court party tory, and come here for mischief, you've got into a
place that will ditter prove too hot for you; but if, as I rather
think, you are, or der want to be, something better, and can let
us into the shape and fix of matters and things over there at ditter
head-quarters, you may be the chap we would like to see. Ditter
speak out therefore, like a man, and no more of your ditter
squizzling.”

After a few more evasive remarks, in which he succeeded in
drawing out the other more fully, and causing him the more completely
to commit himself, Bart threw aside all bantering, and
proceeded to relate all his discoveries relative to the contemplated
movement of the court party.

“Ditter devils and dumplings!” exclaimed the hunter, as, with
eyes sparkling with excitement, he sprang to his feet, as the
other finished his recital. “This must be made known directly.

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Come — der follow me, and I'll take you to the company you
ditter said you wished to see.”

So saying, he immediately led the way through a dark entry to
a room in the rear of the house, which the two now entered;
when Bart found himself in a company of nearly twenty grave
and stern-looking men, deliberating in a regularly organized
meeting.

“Ditter here, Captain Wright,” eagerly commenced Dunning,
as he entered, addressing the chairman, a prompt, fine-looking
man, and the leading whig of the village; “here is one,” he
continued, pointing to Bart, “one who brings ditter news that —”

“Esquire Knowlton, of Townsend, has the floor now,” said
the chairman, interrupting the speaker, and directing his attention
to a middle-aged man of a gentlemanly, intelligent appearance,
who was standing on one side of the room, having suspended the
remarks he was making at the entrance of Dunning and his companion.

“As I was remarking, Mr. Chairman,” now resumed the gentleman
who had been thus interrupted in his speech, “the tory
party, acting under various disguises, have been, for several
months past, secretly using every means within their reach to
strengthen their unrighteous rule in this already sadly oppressed
section of the country. They aim to bring the people into a state
of bondage and slavery. When no cash is stirring, with which
debts can be paid, they purposely multiply suits, seize property,
which they well know can never be redeemed, and take it into
their hands, that they may make the people dependent on them,
and subservient to their party purposes. And just so far as they
find themselves strengthened by these and other disguised movements,
so far they betray their intention to curtail all freedom of
opinion, and to overawe us by open acts of oppression. Here,
one man has been thrown into prison on the charge of high treason;
when all they proved against him was the remark, that if
the king had signed the Quebec bill, he had broken his coronation
oath. There, another, a poor harmless recluse, as I have
ever supposed him, is dragged from his hut in the mountains,
and imprisoned to await his trial for an alleged murder, committed
long ago, and in another jurisdiction; when his only
crime, with his prosecutors, probably, is his bold denunciations of
their tyranny, unless, as some suspect, even a baser motive actuates
them. They even proclaim, that all who dare question the
king's right to tax us without our consent, are guilty of high treason,
and worthy of death! For myself, I seek not, the suspension

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of this court at this time, on account of the questionable jurisdiction
of New York merely, but because the court, itself bitterly
tory in all its branches, is sustained by a colony which refuses to
adopt the resolves of the Continental Congress, and thereby continues
to force upon us the royal authority, which our brethren of
the other colonies have almost every where put down, and which
in our case, Heaven knows, is not the least deserving the fate it
has met elsewhere. And the question, then, now comes home
to us, Shall we tolerate it any longer? The hearts of the people,
though their tongues may often be awed into silence — the hearts
of the people are ready to respond their indignant no! And I, for
one, am ready to join in the cry, and stepping into the first rank
of the opposers of arbitrary power, breast the storm in discharging
my duty to my country.”

“Amen!” was the deep and general response of the company.

“Mr. Dunning will now be heard,” said the chairman, motioning
to the former to come forward.

“Ditter well, Captain — der — ditter Mr. Moderator, I mean.
I, being on the watch against ditter interlopers, you know, have
just picked up an odd coon, here, who ditter seems to have ears
in one place and tongue in another; and his story is a ditter loud
one. But let him tell it in his own way. So now, Barty Burt,”
he continued, going up to the other, who stood by the fire, kicking
the fore-stick with his usual air of indifference; “come forward,
and tell the meeting all you have der seen and heard, in the
ditter camp of the Philistines.”

Bart, then, mostly in the way of answers to a series of rapid
questions, put by the chairman, who seemed to know him, and
understand the best way of drawing him out, — Bart then related
his discoveries to his astonished and indignant auditors, giving
such imitations of the manner of each of the company, whose
words he was repeating, as not only showed their meaning in its
full force, but at once convinced all present of the truth of his
story.

No sooner had Bart closed, than a half dozen of the company
sprang to their feet, in their eagerness to express their indignation
and abhorrence of the bloody plot, which their opponents,
under the garb of peace and fair promises, had, it was now evident,
been hatching against them.

“Order, gentlemen!” cried the chairman: “I don't wonder
you all want to denounce the detestable and cowardly conduct
of the tyrants. But one only can be heard at a time, and Mr.

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French, I rather think, was fairly up first, and he will therefore
proceed.”

While all others, on hearing this remark of the chairman,
resumed their seats, the person thus named, as privileged to
speak first, remained standing. He was a young man, of about
twenty-two, of a ready, animated appearance, while every look
and motion of his ardent countenance and restless muscles proclaimed
him to be of the most sanguine temperament and enthusiastic
feelings. An almost unnatural excitement was sparkling
in his kindling eyes, and a sort of wild, fitful, sad, and prophetic
air characterized his whole appearance as he began.

“It has come at last, then! I knew it was coming. I have
felt it for months; waking and sleeping, I have felt it. In my
dreams I have seen blood in the skies, and heard sounds of battle
in the air and earth. Dreams of themselves, I know, are generally
without sign or significance; but when the spirit of a dream
remains on the mind through the waking hours, as it has on
mine, I know it has a meaning. Something has been hurrying
me to be ready for the great event. I could not help coming
here to-night. I cannot help being here to-morrow. The event
and the time are at hand! I see it now — resistance, and battle,
and blood! Let it come! the victims are ready; and their blood,
poured out on the wood on the altar of liberty, will bring down
fire from heaven to consume the oppressors!”

There was a short silence among the company, who seemed to
pause, in surprise and awe, at the strange words and manner of
the young man, which evidently made an impression on his hearers
at the time, and which were afterwards remembered, and
often repeated, at the fireside, in recounting his untimely fate.”

“Mr. Fletcher,” at length observed the chairman, breaking
the silence — “Mr. Fletcher, of Newfane, is next entitled to
speak, I believe.”

“I rose, Mr. Chairman,” said the latter, a fine specimen of the
hardy, resolute, and intelligent yeoman of the times — “I rose but
to ask whether the news just received can be relied on: “can it
be, that Judge Chandler, after his pledge to us at Chester, would
be guilty of conduct reflecting so deeply on his character as a
man?”

“I am not wholly unprepared to believe the story myself,”
replied the chairman; “our young friend here may have his peculiarities;
but I consider him a thousand times more honest and
honorable, than some of those whose sly hints and treacherous
conduct he has so well described.”

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“Ditter, look here, Mr. Moderator,” interposed Dunning. “I
was once, ditter travelling, in the Bay State, with a friend, when
we came across a meeting-house with eight sides, and my friend
asked me what order of architecture I called it. Ditter well, I
was fairly treed, and couldn't tell. But I should be able to tell
now. I should ditter call it the Chandler order.”

A desultory but animated debate now arose. Various methods
of accomplishing what appeared to be the settled determination of
all — that of preventing the sitting of the court — were suggested.
Some proposed to dismantle or tear down the Court House; others
were for arming the people, seizing the building, and bidding
open defiance to their opponents. At this stage of the deliberations,
Colonel Carpenter, whose character had secured him great
influence, rose, and requested to be heard.

“From the gathering signs of the times,” said he, “we have
good reason to believe that the smouldering fires of liberty will
soon burst forth into open revolution throughout these oppressed
and insulted colonies. Our movements here may lead to the
opening scene of the great drama; and we must give our foes
no advantages by our imprudence. If we are the first to appear
in arms, it may weaken our cause, while it strengthens theirs.
Let them be the first to do this — let us place them in the wrong,
and then, if they have recourse to violence and bloodshed, we
will act; and no fear but the people will find means to arm themselves.
Let us, therefore, go into the Court House to-morrow, in
a body, but without a single offensive implement, and resist
peacefully, but firmly; and then, if they dare make a martyr,
his blood will do more for our cause than would now a regiment
of rifles.”

Although this prudent and far-sighted proposal was for a while
opposed, by the more ardent and unthinking part of the company,
yet it was at length adopted by the whole; and having made arrangements
to carry it into effect, the meeting broke up, and all
retired to their respective lodgings.

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