him as she spoke, a little,
bent, slightly deformed figure, with a face shrivelled and faded like a
winter-russet apple in spring-time, and a dress patched and darned
till one scarcely could tell what the original was like, in a striking
contrast to the tall, broad-shouldered, hale old man, whose iron frame
had defied the storms of more than seventy winters; but I remember how
he seemed to me a mere pigmy by the side of the generous, large-hearted
woman whose tones and gestures had a protectiveness, a strength born of
love and pity, that reassured us trembling little fugitives in spite of
our ungracious reception. We felt that Aunt Polly would take care of us,
let what would come.

"The hours dragged slowly away. Aunt Polly told us that the distant
firing meant that our men had not retreated without an effort to defend
the village. When this firing ceased, we began to watch and hope that
some message would come from our fathers and mothers. But none came. We
wondered among our little selves if they all had been put to death by
the British, and even the oldest among us shed some dreary tears.

"Dan Parsons, who was the biggest boy among us and of an adventurous
turn, went in the gathering twilight gloom down as near the village as
he dared. He came shivering back to us with such tales of vague horror
that our very hearts stopped beating while we listened.

"'I crep' along under the shadder of the alders and black-berry bushes,'
he began, ''til I got close ter De'con Milleses house. 'Twas as still
as death 'round there, but jest as I turned the corner by the barn I see
somethin' gray a-flappin' and a-flutterin' jest inside the barn door. I
stopped, kind o' wonderin' what it could be, when all at once I thought
I should 'a' dropped, for it came over me like a flash that it might
be'--

"'What, what, Dan?' cried a score of frightened voices; and Dan replied
solemnly:

"'THE OLD DEACON'S SKULP!'

"'Oh dear! oh dear!' sobbed the terrified chorus.

"Aunt Polly could do nothing with us; and little Dolly Miles, the
deacon's granddaughter, burst into a series of wild lamentations that
called Farmer Gubtil to the door to know the cause of the commotion.

"'What's all this hullabaloo about?' he asked crossly; and when he had
heard the story he seized Dan and shook him till his teeth chattered.

"'What do you mean by tellin' such stuff an' scarin' these young ones
ter death?' he demanded.

"Dan wriggled himself from his