"That's about the size of it."

"But the farm?"

"We will raise as much as we can in money, and let the rest go.
To tell the truth, Lucy, it isn't the first time I have
thought of doing it. I don't care about knuckling under to
any man, as these folk do to their darned prophet. I'm a
free-born American, and it's all new to me. Guess I'm too
old to learn. If he comes browsing about this farm, he might
chance to run up against a charge of buckshot travelling in
the opposite direction."

"But they won't let us leave," his daughter objected.

"Wait till Jefferson comes, and we'll soon manage that.
In the meantime, don't you fret yourself, my dearie,
and don't get your eyes swelled up, else he'll be walking into
me when he sees you. There's nothing to be afeared about,
and there's no danger at all."

John Ferrier uttered these consoling remarks in a very
confident tone, but she could not help observing that he paid
unusual care to the fastening of the doors that night, and
that he carefully cleaned and loaded the rusty old shotgun
which hung upon the wall of his bedroom.