t, to the eye of discernment a perfect
jostle of public institutions comparable only to Threadneedle Street or
Lower Broadway. On all the side streets there are maple trees and
broad sidewalks, trim gardens with upright calla lilies, houses with
verandahs, which are here and there being replaced by residences with
piazzas.

To the careless eye the scene on the Main Street of a summer afternoon
is one of deep and unbroken peace. The empty street sleeps in the
sunshine. There is a horse and buggy tied to the hitching post in front
of Glover's hardware store. There is, usually and commonly, the burly
figure of Mr. Smith, proprietor of Smith's Hotel, standing in his
chequered waistcoat on the steps of his hostelry, and perhaps, further
up the street, Lawyer Macartney going for his afternoon mail, or the
Rev. Mr. Drone, the Rural Dean of the Church of England Church, going
home to get his fishing rod after a mothers' auxiliary meeting.

But this quiet is mere appearance. In reality, and to those who know it,
the place is a perfect hive of activity. Why, at Netley's butcher shop
(established in 1882) there are no less than four men working on the
sausage machines in the basement; at the Newspacket office there are
as many more job-printing; there is a long distance telephone with
four distracting girls on high stools wearing steel caps and talking
incessantly; in the offices in McCarthy's block are dentists and lawyers
with their coats off, ready to work at any moment; and from the big
planing factory down beside the lake where the railroad siding is, you
may hear all through the hours of the summer afternoon the long-drawn
music of the running saw.

Busy--well, I should think so! Ask any of its inhabitants if Mariposa
isn't a busy, hustling, thriving town. Ask Mullins, the manager of the
Exchange Bank, who comes hustling over to his office from the Mariposa
House every day at 10.30 and has scarcely time all morning to go out and
take a drink with the manager of the Commercial; or ask--well, for
the matter of that, ask any of them if they ever knew a more rushing
go-a-head town than Mariposa.

Of course if you come to the place fresh from New York, you are
deceived. Your standard of vision is all astray, You do think the place
is quiet. You do imagine that Mr. Smith is asleep merely because he
closes his eyes as he stands. But live in Mariposa for six months or a
year and then you will begin to understand it better; the b