guise their profession, or to soothe the nerves
of some patient who may be gazing from a window.

Yet they are not to be censured, since Death, their antagonist, here
drives slowly too. The number of the aged among us is surprising, and
explains some phenomena otherwise strange. You will notice, for
instance, that there are no posts before the houses in Oldport to which
horses may be tied. Fashionable visitors might infer that every horse
is supposed to be attended by a groom. Yet the tradition is, that there
were once as many posts here as elsewhere, but that they were removed
to get rid of the multitude of old men who leaned all day against them.
It obstructed the passing. And these aged citizens, while permitted to
linger at their posts, were gossiping about men still older, in earthly
or heavenly habitations, and the sensation of longevity went on
accumulating indefinitely in their talk. Their very disputes had a
flavor of antiquity, and involved the reputation of female relatives to
the third or fourth generation. An old fisherman testified in our
Police Court, the other day, in narrating the progress of a street
quarrel; "Then I called him 'Polly Garter,'--that's his grandmother;
and he called me 'Susy Reynolds,'--that's my aunt that's dead and gone."

In towns like this, from which the young men mostly migrate, the work
of life devolves upon the venerable and the very young. When I first
came to Oldport, it appeared to me that every institution was conducted
by a boy and his grandfather. This seemed the case, for instance, with
the bank that consented to assume the slender responsibility of my
deposits. It was further to be observed, that, if the elder official
was absent for a day, the boy carried on the proceedings unaided; while
if the boy also wished to amuse himself elsewhere, a worthy neighbor
from across the way came in to fill the places of both. Seeing this, I
retained my small hold upon the concern with fresh tenacity; for who
knew but some day, when the directors also had gone on a picnic, the
senior depositor might take his turn at the helm? It may savor of
self-confidence, but it has always seemed to me, that, with one day's
control of a bank, even in these degenerate times, something might be
done which would quite astonish the stockholders.

Longer acquaintance has, however, revealed the fact, that these Oldport
institutions stand out as models of strict discipline beside their
suburban compeers.