"Nor I," interposed the other lady, playfully, but with considerable
spirit. "Mr. Jones has really excited my curiosity by his account of
this young plough-jogger. I should like to get a sight of
him--shouldn't you, Sabrey?"

But the latter, though evidently musing on the subject, and mentally
discussing some unpleasant doubts and inferences which it seemed to
present to her active mind, yet evaded the question, and turned the
conversation, by directing the attention of her companion and the rest
of the company to a distant object in the wild landscape, which here
opened to their view. This was the tall, rugged mountain, which,
rising from the eastern shore of the Connecticut, was here, through an
opening in the trees, seen looming and lifting its snowy crest to the
clouds, and greeting the gladdened eyes of the way-worn travellers
with the silent but welcome announcement that they were now within a
few miles of the great river, and in the still more immediate vicinity
of their intended halting-place--the thriving little village which was
then just starting into life, under the auspices of the man from whom
its name was derived--the enterprising Colonel Brattle, of Massachusetts.

Having now the advantage of a road, which, as it received the many
concentrating paths of a thicker settlement, here began to be
comparatively firm, the travellers passed rapidly over the descending
grounds, and, in a short time, entered the village. As they were
dashing along towards the village inn, at a full trot, a man, with a
vehicle drawn by one horse, approaching in an intersecting road from
the south, struck into the same street a short distance before them.
His whole equipment was very obviously of the most simple
character,--a rough board box, resting on four upright wooden pins
inserted into a couple of saplings, which were bent up in front for