pe you are well. And how's
your dad?"

Robert replied that his father was well.

"Here, Joe; put this mare in the stable, and give her a good rubbing
down. She's as nice a piece as ever went on four legs."

The hostler took the reins and Robert stepped from the wagon.

"Pete Augustus, take this gentleman's trunk up to Devonshire. It will
be your room, Mr. Walden."

Robert followed the negro upstairs, and discovered that each room had
its distinctive name. He could have carried the trunk, but as he was
to be a gentleman, it would not be dignified were he to shoulder it.
He knew he must be in the market early in the morning, and went to bed
soon after supper. He might have gone at once to Copp's Hill, assured
of a hearty welcome in the Brandon home, but preferred to make the
Green Dragon his abiding-place till through with the business that
brought him to Boston.

II.

FIRST DAY IN BOSTON.

Farmers from the towns around Boston were already in the market-place
around Faneuil Hall the next morning when Robert drove down from the
Green Dragon.[11] Those who had quarters of beef and lamb for sale
were cutting the meat upon heavy oaken tables. Fishermen were bringing
baskets filled with mackerel and cod from their boats moored in the
dock. An old man was pushing a wheelbarrow before him filled with
lobsters. Housewives followed by negro servants were purchasing meats
and vegetables, holding eggs to the light to see if they were fresh,
tasting pats of butter, handling chickens, and haggling with the
farmers about the prices of what they had to sell.

[Footnote 11: The market was held in the open space around Faneuil
Hall, in which were rails where the farmers from the surrounding towns
hitched their horses. It was bounded on one side by the dock where the
fishermen moored their boats.]

The town-crier was jingling his bell and shouting that Thomas Russell
at the auction room on Queen Street would sell a great variety of
plain and spotted, lilac, scarlet, strawberry-colored, and yellow
paduasoys, bellandine silks, sateens, galloons, ferrets, grograms, and
harratines at half past ten o'clock.

Robert tied Jenny to the hitching-rail, and walked amid the hucksters
to see what they had to sell; by observation he could ascertain the
state of the market, and govern himself accordingly. After
interviewing the hucksters he entered a store.

"No, I don't want any cheese," said the first on whom he called.

[Illu