knows

A life on the ocean wave
And a home on the rollin' deep,

none o' your stiff starched, nigger driven, cat o' nine tails, ornery
common soldiers."

Tryphena snickered a little, but the constable went on with his
breakfast, not deigning to waste a syllable on such unmilitary trash as
Sylvanus, with whom it was impossible to reason, and to come to blows
with whom might imperil his dignity. Some day, perhaps, Pilgrim might be
his prisoner; then, the majesty of the law would be vindicated.

A messenger came and summoned the constable to accompany the coroner,
Dr. Halbert, to Richards, and bring the body of the murdered detective
to the post office. On such an occasion, the pensioner's dignity would
not allow him to drive the waggon, so Rufus had to be pressed into the
service. Squire Walker, as the presiding magistrate, in view of
Carruthers personal connection with the death of the subject of the
jury's verdict, appointed the detective temporary clerk of the court
that should sit after the inquests were over. Fearing that few of the
settlers warned would turn out as jurors, through fear of the Select
Encampment people, the master of Bridesdale chose a sufficient number of
men for the purpose from the present sojourners at his house. These,
some time after the doctor's departure, sauntered leisurely towards the
most public place in the neighbourhood. Arrived at the post office, they
found a large unfinished room in an adjoining building prepared for the
court. This building had been begun as a boarding house, but, when
almost completed, the conviction suddenly came to the post office people
that there were no boarders to be had, all the transients of any
financial value being given free quarters in the hospitable mansion of
the Squire. Hence the house was never finished. The roof, however, was
on, and the main room floored, so that it had been utilized for church
and Sunday school purposes, for an Orange Lodge, for temperance and
magic lantern itinerant lectures, and for local hops. Now, with the dead
body of Harding laid out upon an improvised table of rough boards on
trestles, it assumed the most solemn aspect it had ever exhibited. Three
oldish men were there, whom people called Johnson, Newberry, and
Pawkins; they were all the summoned jurors who had responded. Soon, from
the other side, the waggon came in sight, and when it came forward, the
remains of Nagle, alias Nash, were lifted reverently out