earance and that presently the
rough-looking shanty-men will change their clothes and turn back again
into farmers.

Then the sun shines warmer and the maple trees come out and Lawyer
Macartney puts on his tennis trousers, and that's summer time. The
little town changes to a sort of summer resort. There are visitors up
from the city. Every one of the seven cottages along the lake is full.
The Mariposa Belle churns the waters of the Wissanotti into foam as she
sails out from the wharf, in a cloud of flags, the band playing and the
daughters and sisters of the Knights of Pythias dancing gaily on the
deck.

That changes too. The days shorten. The visitors disappear. The golden
rod beside the meadow droops and withers on its stem. The maples blaze
in glory and die. The evening closes dark and chill, and in the gloom
of the main corner of Mariposa the Salvation Army around a naphtha lamp
lift up the confession of their sins--and that is autumn. Thus the year
runs its round, moving and changing in Mariposa, much as it does in
other places.

If, then, you feel that you know the town well enough to be admitted
into the inner life and movement of it, walk down this June afternoon
half way down the Main Street--or, if you like, half way up from the
wharf--to where Mr. Smith is standing at the door of his hostelry. You
will feel as you draw near that it is no ordinary man that you approach.
It is not alone the huge bulk of Mr. Smith (two hundred and eighty
pounds as tested on Netley's scales). It is not merely his costume,
though the chequered waistcoat of dark blue with a flowered pattern
forms, with his shepherd's plaid trousers, his grey spats and
patent-leather boots, a colour scheme of no mean order. Nor is it
merely Mr. Smith's finely mottled face. The face, no doubt, is a notable
one,--solemn, inexpressible, unreadable, the face of the heaven-born
hotel keeper. It is more than that. It is the strange dominating
personality of the man that somehow holds you captive. I know nothing in
history to compare with the position of Mr. Smith among those who drink
over his bar, except, though in a lesser degree, the relation of the
Emperor Napoleon to the Imperial Guard.

When you meet Mr. Smith first you think he looks like an over-dressed
pirate. Then you begin to think him a character. You wonder at his
enormous bulk. Then the utter hopelessness of knowing what Smith is
thinking by merely looking at his features gets on your m