tion to desolation, but carried
always with him the equal mind of a philosopher. Not even the occasional
tart remarks of his wife, about their nomadic life and his serenity in
the midst of discomfort, could ruffle his smooth spirit.

He was, in every respect, a most worthy man, truthful, honest,
temperate, and, I need not say, frugal; and he had no bad
habits,--perhaps he never had energy enough to acquire any. Nor did
he lack the knack of the Yankee race. He could make a shoe, or build
a house, or doctor a cow; but it never seemed to him, in this brief
existence, worth while to do any of these things. He was an excellent
angler, but he rarely fished; partly because of the shortness of days,
partly on account of the uncertainty of bites, but principally because
the trout brooks were all arranged lengthwise and ran over so much
ground. But no man liked to look at a string of trout better than he
did, and he was willing to sit down in a sunny place and talk about
trout-fishing half a day at a time, and he would talk pleasantly and
well too, though his wife might be continually interrupting him by a
call for firewood.

I should not do justice to his own idea of himself if I did not add that
he was most respectably connected, and that he had a justifiable though
feeble pride in his family. It helped his self-respect, which no ignoble
circumstances could destroy. He was, as must appear by this time, a most
intelligent man, and he was a well-informed man; that is to say, he read
the weekly newspapers when he could get them, and he had the average
country information about Beecher and Greeley and the Prussian war
("Napoleon is gettin' on't, ain't he?"), and the general prospect of
the election campaigns. Indeed, he was warmly, or rather luke-warmly,
interested in politics. He liked to talk about the inflated currency,
and it seemed plain to him that his condition would somehow be improved
if we could get to a specie basis. He was, in fact, a little troubled
by the national debt; it seemed to press on him somehow, while his
own never did. He exhibited more animation over the affairs of the
government than he did over his own,--an evidence at once of his
disinterestedness and his patriotism. He had been an old abolitionist,
and was strong on the rights of free labor, though he did not care to
exercise his privilege much. Of course he had the proper contempt for
the poor whites down South. I never saw a person with more correct