Honor, _the_ banquet is to be here. Have you not heard?"

"What is the banquet to be for?"

"In honor of Franklin, sir."

Mr. Calamity turned round on his cane and took out his snuffbox.

There was an outburst of music, a great shout, and a hurrying of people
toward the green grove.

Something loomed in air.

The old gentleman, putting his hand over his eye as a shade, looked up
in great surprise.

"What--what is that?"

What indeed!

"A boat sailing in the air?" He added, "Franklin must have invented
that!"

"No," said the official, "that is the great barge."

"What is it for?"

"It will exhibit itself shortly," said the official.

It came on, covered with banners that waved in the river winds.

The old man read the inscription upon it--"_Franklin_."

"I told you so," he said.

"It will thunder soon," said the official. "Don't you see it is armed
with guns?"

The barge stopped at the entrance of the grove. A discharge of cannon
followed from the boat, which was forty feet long. A great shout
followed the salute. The whole city seemed cheering. The name that
filled the air was "_Franklin_."

Mr. Calamity turned around and around, planting his cane down in a
manner that left a circle, and then taking out of his pocket his
snuffbox.

He saw a boy cheering.

"Boy!"

"Sir?"

"What are _you_ shouting for?"

"For the Stamp Act, sir!"

"That is right, my boy."

"No, for Franklin!"

"For Franklin? Why, I have seen him carrying a lot of printing paper
through the streets in a wheelbarrow! May time be gracious to me, so
that I may see him hanged! Boy, see here----"

But the banners were moving into the green grove, and the boy had gone
after them.

Benjamin Franklin returned to Philadelphia the most popular man in the
colonies, and was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress.

"Only Heaven can save us now," said troubled Mr. Calamity. "There's
treason in the air!"

The old gentleman was not a bad man; he saw life on the side of shadow,
and had become blind to the sunny side of life. He was one of those
natures that are never able to come out of the past.

The people amid the rising prosperity ceased to believe in old Mr.
Calamity as a prophet. He felt this loss of faith in him. He assumed
the character of the silent wise man at times. He would pass people whom
he had warned of the coming doom, shaking his head, and then turning
around would strike his cane heavily on the paveme