he could easily
foresee that if the owner of the estate should be driven off, the
property and its proceeds, probably for a series of years, would be
very apt to fall under his own control and management. Many a patriot
has been made by anticipations less brilliant than these; and as Joel
and the miller talked the matter over between them, they had calculated
all the possible emolument of fattening beeves, and packing pork for
hostile armies, or isolated frontier posts, with a strong gusto for the
occupation. Should open war but fairly commence, and could the captain
only be induced to abandon the Knoll, and take refuge within a British
camp, everything might be made to go smoothly, until settling day
should follow a peace. At that moment, _non est inventus_ would be
a sufficient answer to a demand for any balance.

"They tell me," said Joel, in an aside to the miller, "that law is as
good as done with in the Bay colony, already; and you know if the law
has run out _there_, it will quickly come to an end, here. York
never had much character for law."

"That's true, Joel; then you know the captain himself is the only
magistrate hereabout; and, when he is away, we shall have to be
governed by a committee of safety, or something of that natur'."

"A committee of safety will be the thing!"

"What is a committee of safety, Joel?" demanded the miller, who had
made far less progress in the arts of the demagogue than his friend,
and who, in fact, had much less native fitness for the vocation; "I
have heer'n tell of them regulations, but do not rightly understand
'em, a'ter all."

"You know what a committee is?" asked Joel, glancing inquiringly at his
friend.

"I s'pose I do--it means men's takin' on themselves the trouble and
care of public business."

"That's it--now a committee of safety means a few of us, for instance,
having the charge of the affairs of this settlement, in order to see
that no harm shall come to anything, especially to the people."

"It would be a good thing to have one, here. The carpenter, and you,
and I might be members, Joel."

"We'll talk about it, another time. The corn is just planted, you know;
and it has got to be hoed _twice_, and topped, before it can be
gathered. Let us wait and see how things come on at Boston."

While this incipient plot was thus slowly coming to a head, and the
congregation was gradually collecting at the chapel, a very different
scene was enacting in the Hut. B