The Further Adventures of Quincy Adams Sawyer and Masons Corner Folks | Page 3

what she told me about her husband sitting on the ridge pole of
the barn, blowing his horn, and waiting for Gabriel to come for him."
As Robert Wood came up, Quincy stepped from the line to greet him.
"Your hand ain't quite as hard as it was five years ago," said Robert.
"No, I'm out of practice. You could handle me now."
"It cost me two dollars to get my watch fixed," said Robert,
irrelevantly.

"I was on time in that affair," said Quincy, conscious, when too late,
that he had wasted a pun on an obtuse individual. "Are you still
carpentering?"
"Yes. Lots of new houses going up, and Ben Bates and me have all we
can handle. Here, Ben, come here. The Governor's askin' 'bout you."
Benjamin Bates was rather diffident, and had been holding back, but at
Bob's invitation came forward.
"How d'ye do, Governor?" was his salutation. Diffidence when forced
to action often verges on forwardness.
"Glad to meet you again," said Quincy. "Robert says they keep you
busy."
"Yes, we don't have so many resting spells now they use donkey
engines as we did when Pat or Mike had to climb the ladder."
"The march of improvement forces us all into line," said Quincy as he
greeted Miss Seraphina Cotton.
"Teaching school, now, Miss Cotton?"
"No, your Excellency, I am fortunately relieved from what became,
near the end of my long years of service, an intolerable drudgery.
Teaching American children to talk English is one thing, but teaching
French Canadians, Poles, Germans, Russians, Italians, and Greeks was
quite a different proposition."
"And yet it is a most important work," said Quincy--"making good
citizens from these various nationalities. America, to-day, is like a large
garden, with a great variety of flowers from foreign stalks."
Miss Cotton smiled somewhat satirically. "I'm afraid, your Excellency,
if you'd ever been a school teacher, you'd have found many weeds in
the garden."
"But how did you gain your freedom?" asked Quincy. "Did they

pension you?"
"Oh, no. An uncle died out West and left me enough with which to buy
an annuity. I board with the Reverend Mr. Howe. You remember him?"
"Why, certainly, I do. And here's his son, Emmanuel--have I got the
name right?"
"Yes, Governor, just right as to sound. I spell it with an 'E' and two
M's," said young Mr. Howe, as Miss Cotton moved on to tell of her
good fortune to Alice and Linda.
"How's your father, now? Does he preach every Sunday?"
"Reg'lar as clock work. Of course I couldn't tell everybody, but I
reckon he's using some old sermons that he wrote forty years ago, but
the young ones never heard them, and the old ones have forgotten."
Quincy laughed. Ministers' sons are seldom appalled by worldly ways
and, quite often, adopt them.
"This is Arthur Scates," said Mr. Strout, as he presented a young man
with sunken cheeks, hollow eyes, and an emaciated body. "He ain't
enjoyin' the best of health."
"Ah, I remember," said Quincy. "You are the young man who was to
sing at the concert when I first came here. I took your place, and that
act turned out to be the most important one in my life. I owe much of
my present happiness to you. What is your trouble?"
"My lungs are affected. I have lost my voice and cannot sing. I had
counted on becoming an opera singer."
"Why do you not go to one of the out-door hospitals for treatment?"
The young man's face flushed, and he remained silent.
"Pardon me," said Quincy. "I understand. Come to Boston next week,
to the State House, and I will see that you have the best of treatment."

"Wall, Mr. Sawyer, it does one's eyes good to set 'em on you again.
This is Olive Green,--you remember her sister Betsey worked for me
when you was one of my boarders." The woman's voice was loud and
strident, and filled the room.
"Mrs. Hawkins, I shall never forget you and Miss Betsey Green, and
how you both tried to make my stay with you a pleasant one."
"You've put on consid'rable flesh since I saw yer last. Guess you've
been taking your meals reg'lar, which you never did when you lived
with me. But your market's made now, and that makes the difference.
They say folks in love have poor appetites." She laughed loudly, and
stopped only when Olive put a restraining hand on her arm. "I hope
Alice is a good cook, but she never had much chance to learn."
Quincy thought it was time to change the subject. "How's Mr.
Hawkins?"
"I tell him he's just as lazy as ever. He's kalkerlatin' on getting three
good broods of chickens. He's gone on chickens. He wanted to come