struggled for better positions, and the people in wagons and carriages
stood upon seats, while the pedestrians besieged them, climbing on the
wheels, or balancing recklessly, with feet on the hubs of opposite wagons.
Everybody was bound to see _him_. When the whistle announced the coming of
the train, the band began to play, the cannon fired, horns blew, and the
cheering echoed and reechoed till heaven's vault resounded with the noise
the people of Carlow were making.

There was one heart which almost stopped beating. Helen was standing on
the front seat of the Briscoe buckboard, with Minnie beside her, and, at
the commotion, the horses pranced and backed so that Lige Willetts ran to
hold them; but she did not notice the frightened roans, nor did she know
that Minnie clutched her round the waist to keep her from falling. Her
eyes were fixed intently on the smoke of the far-away engine, and her
hand, lifted to her face in an uncertain, tremulous fashion, as it was one
day in a circus tent, pressed against the deepest blush that ever mantled
a girl's cheek. When the train reached the platform, she saw Briscoe and
the others rush into the car, and there ensued what was to her an almost
intolerable pause of expectation, while the crowd besieged the windows of
the smoker, leaning up and climbing on each other's shoulders to catch the
first glimpse of _him_. Briscoe and a red-faced young man, a stranger to
Plattville, came down the steps, laughing like boys, and then Keating and
Bence, and then Warren Smith. As the lawyer reached the platform, he
turned toward the door of the car and waved his hand as in welcome.

"Here he is, boys!" he shouted, "Welcome Home!" At that it was as if all
the noise that had gone before had been mere leakage of pent-up
enthusiasm. A thousand horns blared deafeningly, the whistles of the
engine and of Hibbard's mill were added to the din, the court-house bell
was pealing out a welcome, and the church bells were ringing, the cannon