nd it is sometimes rather difficult to sift the genuine
stuff from the chaff. I really don't know how much to believe of the
anecdotes of Connecticut peddlers of former times. It is a matter of
history, that they sold wooden nutmegs, and horn gun flints, and
white-wood cucumber seeds, and white oak hams. But I should not wonder
if these stories were made out of whole cloth. The truth is, there
have been, first and last, a great many false charges made against
"the land of steady habits."

It is a common notion that peddlers are very apt to make dupes of the
ladies. Perhaps they are. But I know of one instance in which a
peddler got nicely come up with by a lady. I don't believe any man
could have done it better. The story is this. A peddler, with a wagon
load of tin ware, drove up to the door of a house around which quite a
number of children were playing. The mistress of the house made her
appearance, and was urged to trade. She had no money, she said. That
was no matter, the peddler replied. He would take anything in
pay--rags, old clothes, worn out tin, anything. But she hadn't got
_anything_.

"Well," the peddler continued, "I'll take one of your children."

The lady thought a moment. "Very good," said she, "you may have that
ragged boy yonder for ten dollars, and I'll take the value of him in
tin."

The bargain was struck.

The lady selected the tin ware, and it was carried into the house. The
peddler mounted his seat, with the ragged urchin by his side, and
threatened to drive off. "Of course," he thought, "she will not let
me go away with the boy. She will pay me the money, when she sees that
I am _raly_ going." He was mistaken, though. He had reckoned without
his host, this time.

Crack went the whip. "I'm going now," said he. "I'm off in less than
no time."

"Very well," said the good woman; "so I supposed."

He actually started, and went a few rods, slowly, when he stopped,
turned around, and said, "There, now I'm off for _sartain_."

"So I heard you say some time ago," said the lady.

"But are you willing I should take off this _'ere_ boy?"

"Certainly," said the lady. "We keep the _town's poor_ here, and this
is the worst fellow in the lot."

The story is that the peddler, when he found how completely he was
outwitted, gave, in money, about as much as the tin he had parted with
was worth, to get out of the scrape, or in other words, to get clear
of his young pauper.

CHAP. III.

THE