respect not unlike the wandering minstrels or trouveres, not to
say the Homeric singers of an earlier day. Their stock of news,
their wider experience, their intelligent conversation, and their
sacred minstrelsy procured them often a warm welcome and a night's
lodging outside of Methodist circles. They diffused much useful
information, and their visits dispelled the mental stagnation
which is almost sure to settle upon an isolated community. The
whole household gathering around the evening fire, hung with eager
attention upon their lips as, from their well-stored minds, they
brought forth things new and old. Many an inquisitive boy or girl
experienced a mental awakening or quickening by contact with their
superior intelligence; and many a toil-worn man and woman renewed
the brighter memories of earlier years as the preacher brought
them glimpses of the outer world, or read from some well-worn
volume carried in his saddle-bags pages of some much-prized
English classic.

"Well, there has been news in plenty along the line here," said
the squire, "and likely soon to be more. The Americans have been
massing their forces at Forts Porter, Schlosser, and Niagara, and
we expect will be attempting a crossing somewhere along the river
soon."

"They'll go back quicker than they came, I guess, as they did at
Sandwich," said Zenas, who took an enthusiastically patriotic view
of the prowess of his countrymen.

"I reckon the 'Mericans feel purty sore over that business," said
Tom Loker, who, with Sandy McKay, had come in, and, in the
unconventional style of the period, had drawn up their seats to