Janice Meredith | Page 8

which set the two girls off into ill-suppressed giggles. But finally, relieved of his tormenting head-gear, he was safely seated, and Janice set the dishes in front of him, from all of which he helped himself liberally. Meanwhile, the squire broke the seal of the letter and began to read it.
"Wilt have tea or home brew?" asked Mrs. Meredith.
"Beer for me, marm, thank you. An' I think it only kindly ter say I've hearn talk concernin' your tea drinkin'."
"Let 'em talk," muttered the squire, angrily, looking up from the letter. "'T is nothing to me."
"But Joe Bagby says there 's a scheme ter git the committee of Brunswick township ter take it up."
"Not they," fumed Mr. Meredith. "'T is one thing to write anonymous letters, but quite another matter to stand up and be counted. As for that scamp Joe--"
"Anonymous letters?" questioned Philemon.
"Ay," sputtered the squire, taking from his pocket a paper which he at once crushed into a ball, and then as promptly smoothed out again as a preliminary to handing it to the youth. With difficulty, for the writing was bad, and the paper old and dirty, Philemon read out the following:--
Mister Muridith,-- Noing that agenst the centyments of younited Amurika you still kontiyou to youse tea, thairfor, this is to worn you that we konsider you as an enemy of our kuntry, and if the same praktises are kontinyoud, you will shortly receeve a visit from the kommitty of Tar And Fethers, Brunswick Township.
"The villains!" cried Janice, flushing. "Who can have dared to send it?"
"One of my tenants, like as not," snapped the squire.
"They 'd never dare," asserted Janice.
"Dare!" cried the squire. "What daring does it take to write unsigned threats and nail 'em at night on a door? They get more lawless every day, with their committees and town meetings and mobs. 'T is next to impossible to make 'em pay their rents now, and to hear 'em talk ye'd conclude that they owned their farms and could not be turned off. A pretty state of things when a man with twenty thousand acres under leaseholds has to beg for his rentals, and then does n't get 'em."
"You 'd find it easier ter git your rents, squire, if you only sided more with folks, an' wa'n't so stiff," suggested the youth. "A little yieldin' now an' then--"
"Never!" roared Mr. Meredith. "I'll have no Committee of Correspondence, nor Sons of Liberty, nor Town Meeting telling me what I may do or not do at Greenwood, any more than I let the ragtag and bobtail tell me what I was to buy in '69. Till I say nay, tea is drunk at Greenwood," and the squire's fist came down on the table with a bang.
"Folks say that Congress will shut up the ports," said the young man.
"Ay. And British frigates will open 'em. The people are mad, sir, Bedlam mad, with the idea of liberty, as they call it. Liberty, indeed! when they try to say what a man shall do in his own house; what he shall eat; what he shall wear. And this Congress! We, A and B, elect C to say what the rest of the alphabet shall do, under penalty of tar and feathers, burned ricks, or--don't talk to me, sir, of a Congress. 'T is but an attempt of the mobility to override the nobility of this land, sir. Once again the plates rattled on the table from the squire's fist, and it became evident that if Miss Meredith had a temper it came by inheritance.
"Now, Lambert," interposed his wife, "stop banging the table and getting hot about nothing. Remember how thee hadst the colonies ruined in Stamp Act times, and again during the Association, and it all went over, just as this will. Pour thy father another tankard of small beer, Janice."
Clearly, what the Committee of Correspondence, and even the approaching Congress could not do, Mrs. Meredith could, for the squire settled back quietly into his chair, took a long swallow of beer, and resumed his letter.
"What does Mr. Cauldwell say, dadda?" inquired the daughter.
"Hmm," said Mr. Meredith. "That he sends me the likeliest one from his last shipment. What sort of fellow is he, Phil?"
Hennion paused to swallow an over-large mouthful, which almost produced a choking fit, before he could reply. "He han't a civil word about him, squire--a regular sullen dog."
"Cauldwell writes guardedly, saying it was the best he could do. Where d' ye leave him, lad?"
"Outside, in my waggon."
"Peg, bid him to come in. We'll have a look at--" Mr. Meredith consulted the covenant enclosed and read, "Charles Fownes heigh?"
A moment later, preceded by the maid, Fownes entered. He took a quick, almost furtive, survey of the room, then glanced in succession at each of those seated about the