"The Union fall!" he cried. "Look above, my son! The Union fall! as long as the constellations of evening live together in yonder sky; look down, as long as the great rivers of our land flow eastward and westward, north and south, the Union shall stand up, and stand majestical and bright, beheld by ages, as these shall be, an orb and living stream of glory unsurpassable." The children were gathered about, and watched with eager eyes and glowing cheeks, the countenance of the grandfather as he spoke. "No, no, my son," he added, "there's many a true heart in brave Ohio, as in every state of ours, or they could not be the noble powers they are." While old Sylvester spoke, Oliver Peabody wrenched with some violence, from the tree near which they stood, a stout limb, on the end of which he employed himself with a knife in shaping a substantial knob. "What weapon is that you are busy with, Oliver?" old Sylvester asked. "It's for that nasty bull," Oliver replied. "I would break every bone in his body rather than let him remain for a single minute on my land; the furtherance of law and order demands the instant enforcement of one's rights." "You are a friend of law and order, my son." "I think I am," Oliver answered, standing erect and planting his club, in the manner of Hercules in the pictures, head down on the ground. "I hope you are, Oliver; but I fear you forget the story I used to tell of my old friend Bulkley, of Danbury, who, being written to by some neighboring Christians who were in sore dissension, for advisement, gave them back word:--Every man to look after his own fence, that it be built high and strong, and to have a special care of the old Black Bull; meaning thereby no doubt, our own wicked passions;--that is the true Christian way of securing peace and good order." Oliver threw his great trespass-club upon the ground, and was on the point of asking after an old sycamore, the largest growth of all that country, which, standing in a remote field had, in the perilous times sheltered many of the Peabody family in its bosom--when he was interrupted by the sudden appearance of Mopsey in a flutter of cap-strings, shuffling shoes, and a flying color in her looks of at least double the usual depth of darkness. It was just discovered that the poultry-house had been broken into over night, and four of the fattest hens taken off by the throat and legs, besides sundry of the inferior members of the domicile; as wicked a theft, Mopsey said, as ever was, and she hadn't the slightest hesitation in charging it on them niggers in the Hills, (a neighboring settlement of colored people, who lived from hand to mouth, and seemed to be fed, like the ravens by some mystery of providence.) Oliver Peabody watched closely the countenance of the patriarch, not a little curious to learn what effect this announcement would have upon his temper.