It was "high times" in Tiverton
Hollow when a road needed opening; some idea of the old primitive way
of battling with the untouched forces of nature roused the people to an
exhilaration dashed by no uncertainty of victory.
By afternoon, the excitement had quieted. The men had come in, reddened
by cold, and eaten their noon dinner in high spirits, retailing to the
less fortunate women-folk the stories swapped on the march. Then, as
one man, they succumbed to the drowsiness induced by a morning of wind
in the face, and sat by the stove under some pretense of reading the
county paper, but really to nod and doze, waking only to put another
stick of wood on the fire. So passed all the day before Christmas, and
in the evening the shining lamps were lighted (each with a strip of red
flannel in the oil, to give color), and the neighborhood rested in the
tranquil certainty that something had really come to pass, and that
their communication with the world was reestablished.
Susan Peavey sat by the fire, knitting on a red mitten, and the young
schoolmaster presided over the other hearth corner, reading very hard,
at intervals, and again sinking into a drowsy study of the flames.
There was an impression abroad in Tiverton that the schoolmaster was
going to be somebody, some time.
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