should no more have thought
it possible to stir than to carry off the gates of Gaza on my back.

XVI. LEAVE-TAKINGS

A few days after the tragic passage-at-arms between Hollingsworth and
me, I appeared at the dinner-table actually dressed in a coat, instead
of my customary blouse; with a satin cravat, too, a white vest, and
several other things that made me seem strange and outlandish to
myself. As for my companions, this unwonted spectacle caused a great
stir upon the wooden benches that bordered either side of our homely
board.

"What's in the wind now, Miles?" asked one of them. "Are you deserting
us?"

"Yes, for a week or two," said I. "It strikes me that my health demands
a little relaxation of labor, and a short visit to the seaside, during
the dog-days."

"You look like it!" grumbled Silas Foster, not greatly pleased with the
idea of losing an efficient laborer before the stress of the season was
well over. "Now, here's a pretty fellow! His shoulders have broadened
a matter of six inches since he came among us; he can do his day's
work, if he likes, with any man or ox on the farm; and yet he talks
about going to the seashore for his health! Well, well, old woman,"
added he to his wife, "let me have a plateful of that pork and cabbage!
I begin to feel in a very weakly way. When the others have had their
turn, you and I will take a jaunt to Newport or Saratoga!"

"Well, but, Mr. Foster," said I, "you must allow me to take a little
breath."

"Breath!" retorted the old yeoman. "Your lungs have the play of a pair
of blacksmith's bellows already. What on earth do you want more? But
go along! I understand the business. We shall never see your face
here again. Here ends the reformation of the world, so far as Miles
Coverdale has a hand in it!"

"By no means," I replied. "I am resolute to die in the last ditch, for
the good of the cause."

"Die in a ditch!" muttered gruff Silas, with genuine Yankee intolerance
of any intermission of toil, except on Sunday, the Fourth of July, the
autumnal cattle-show, Thanksgiving, or the annual Fast,--"die in a
ditch! I believe, in my conscience, you would, if there were no
steadier means than your own labor to keep you out of it!"

The truth was, that an intolerable discontent and irksomeness had come
over me. Blithedale was no longer what it had been. Everything was
suddenly faded. The sunburnt and arid aspect of our woods and
pastures, beneath the