ashes with which the wife had on rare occasions opposed the husband's
authority that Hilary Vane found his temper getting the best of him--The
name of Emerson was immutably fixed in his mind as the synonym for
incomprehensible, foolish habits and beliefs. "Don't talk Emerson to me,"
he exclaimed. "And as for Brush Bascom, I've known him for thirty years,
and he's done as much for the Republican party as any man in this State."

This vindication of Mr. Bascom naturally brought to a close a
conversation which had already continued too long. The Honourable Hilary
retired to rest; but--if Austen had known it--not to sleep until the
small hours of the morning.

It was not until the ensuing spring that the case of Mr. Zebulun Meader
against the United Northeastern Railroads came up for trial in Bradford,
the county-seat of Putnam County, and we do not wish to appear to give it
too great a weight in the annals of the State. For one thing, the weekly
newspapers did not mention it; and Mr. Paul Pardriff, when urged to give
an account of the proceedings in the Ripton Record, said it was a matter
of no importance, and spent the afternoon writing an editorial about the
domestic habits of the Aztecs. Mr. Pardriff, however, had thought the
matter of sufficient interest personally to attend the trial, and for the
journey he made use of a piece of green cardboard which he habitually
carried in his pocket. The editor of the Bradford Champion did not have
to use his yellow cardboard, yet his columns may be searched in vain for
the event.

Not that it was such a great event, one of hundreds of railroad accidents
that come to court. The son of Hilary Vane was the plaintiff's counsel;
and Mr. Meader, although he had not been able to work since his release
from the hospital, had been able to talk, and the interest taken in the
case by the average neglected citizen in Putnam proved that the weekly
newspaper is not the only disseminator of news.

The railroad's side of the case was presented by that genial and able
practitioner of Putnam County, Mr. Nathaniel Billings, who travelled from
his home in Williamstown by the exhibition of a red ticket. Austen Vane
had to pay his own way from Ripton, but as he handed back the mileage
book, the conductor leaned over and whispered something in his ear that
made him smile, and Austen thought he would rather have that little drop
of encouragement than a pass. And as he left the car at Bradford, two
gr