stroyed, the houses they burned; all these, are they not
recorded in every child's history in the land?

While these things were going on, for a brief while, at mid-day,
Martha Moulton found her home deserted. She had not forgotten poor,
suffering, irate Uncle John in the regions above, and so, the very
minute she had the chance, she made a strong cup of catnip tea (the
real tea, you know, was brewing in Boston harbor).

She turned the buttons, and, with a bit of trembling at her heart,
such as she had not felt all day, she ventured up the stairs, bearing
the steaming peace-offering before her.

Uncle John was writhing under the sharp thorns and twinges of his old
enemy, and in no frame of mind to receive any overtures in the shape
of catnip tea; nevertheless, he was watching, as well as he was able,
the motions of the enemy. As she drew near, he cried out:

"Look out this window, and see! Much _good_ all your scheming will do
_you_!"

She obeyed his command to look, and the sight she then saw caused her
to let fall the cup of catnip tea and rush down the stairs, wringing
her hands as she went, and crying out:

"Oh, dear! what shall I do? The house will burn and the box up garret.
Everything's lost!"

Major Pitcairn, at that moment, was on the green in front of her door,
giving orders.

Forgetting the dignified part she intended to play; forgetting
everything but the supreme danger that was hovering in mid-air over
her home--the old house wherein she had been born, and the only home
she had ever known--she rushed out upon the green, amid the troops and
surrounded by cavalry, and made her way to Major Pitcairn.

"The court-house is on fire!" she cried, laying her hand upon the
commander's arm.

He turned and looked at her. Major Pitcairn had recently learned that
the task he had been set to do in the provincial towns that day was
not an easy one; that, when hard pressed and trodden down, the
despised rustics, in homespun dress, could sting even English
soldiers; and thus it happened that, when he felt the touch of Mother
Moulton's plump little old fingers on his military sleeve, he was not
in the pleasant humor that he had been when the same hand had
ministered to his hunger in the early morning.

"Well, what of it? _Let it burn!_ We won't hurt _you_, if you go in
the house and stay there!"

She turned and glanced up at the court-house. Already flames were
issuing from it. "Go in the house and let it burn