rose to leave.

"Must you go?" said Grace. "It is such a pleasure to see some one from
the outside." The doctor smiled and lingered.

"I suppose, Squire, you'll get Joe Boynton, the carpenter, to put on the
roof? He's one of my flock."

"Yes," said Penhallow, "but he will want to put his old workman, Peter
Lamb, on the job, and I have no desire to help that man any further. He
gives his mother nothing, and every cent he makes goes for drink."

McGregor nodded approval, but wondered why at last the Squire's unfailing
good-nature had struck for higher wages of virtue in the man he had
ruined by kindness.

"I try to keep work in Westways," said Penhallow. "Joe Shall roof the
chapel, and like as not Peter will be too drunk to help. I can't quite
make it a condition with Joe that he shall not employ Peter, but I should
like to." McGregor's face grew smiling at Penhallow's conclusion when he
added, "I hope he may get work elsewhere." Then the Squire went
downstairs with the doctor, exchanging brevities of talk.

"Are you aware, Penhallow, that this wicked business about Josiah has
beaten Buchanan in Westways? Come to apply the Fugitive-Slave Act and
people won't stand it. As long as it was just a matter of newspaper
discussion Westways didn't feel it, but when it drove away our barber,
Westways's conscience woke up to feel how wicked it was."

The Squire had had an illustration nearer home and kept thinking of it as
he murmured monosyllabic contributions while the doctor went on--"My own
belief is that if the November election were delayed six months, Fremont
would carry Pennsylvania."

Penhallow recovered fuller consciousness and returned, "I distrust
Fremont. I knew him in the West. But he represents, or rather he stands
for, a party, and it is mine."

"I am glad to know that," said McGregor. "I am really glad. It is a
relief to be sure about a man like you, Penhallow. I suppose you know
that you are loved in the county as no one else is."

"Nonsense," exclaimed the Squire, laughing, but not ill-pleased.

"No, I am serious; but it leads up to this: Am I free to say you will
vote the Republican ticket?"

"Yes--yes--you may say so."

"It will be of use, but couldn't I persuade you to speak at the meeting
next week at the mills?"

"No, McGregor. That is not in my line." He had other reasons for refusal.
"Let us drop politics. What is that boy of yours going to do?"

"Study medicine," he says. "He has brains e