her pack of cheap suspenders and blue bandana handkerchiefs.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Grayson," said the Honourable Mr. Caldwell, taking
off his large hat and pausing with one foot on my step.

"Good afternoon, sir," I responded, "won't you come up?"

He sat down in the chair opposite me with a certain measured and
altogether impressive dignity. I cannot say that he was exactly
condescending in his manners, yet he made me feel that it was no small
honour to have so considerable a person sitting there on the porch with
me. At the same time he was outwardly not without a sort of patient
deference which was evidently calculated to put me at my ease. Oh, he
had all the arts of the schooled politician! He knew to the last
shading just the attitude that he as a great man, a leader in Congress,
a dominant force in his party, a possible candidate for Governor (and
yet always a seeker for the votes of the people!) must observe in
approaching a free farmer--like me--sitting at ease in his shirt-sleeves
on his own porch, taking a moment's rest after dinner. It was a perfect
thing to see!

He had evidently heard, what was not altogether true, that I was a
questioner of authority, a disturber of the political peace, and that
(concretely) I was opposing him for reelection. And it was as plain as a
pikestaff that he was here to lay down the political law to me. He would
do it smilingly and patiently, but firmly. He would use all the leverage
of his place, his power, his personal appearance, to crush the
presumptuous uprising against his authority.

I confess my spirits rose at the thought. What in this world is more
enthralling than the meeting of an unknown adversary upon the open
field, and jousting him a tourney. I felt like some modern Robin Hood
facing the panoplied authority of the King's man.

And what a place and time it was for a combat--in the quietude of the
summer afternoon, no sound anywhere breaking the still warmth and
sweetness except the buzzing of bees in the clematis at the end of the
porch--and all about the green countryside, woods and fields and old
fences--and the brown road leading its venturesome way across a distant
hill toward the town.

After explaining who he was--I told him I had recognized him on
sight--we opened with a volley of small shot. We peppered one another
with harmless comments on the weather and the state of the crops. He
advanced cabbages and I countered with sugar-beets. I am quite aware