There were three events which we used to look forward to at the approach of summer with a great deal of interest. These were the Fourth of July, General Training and Camp Meeting. The denizens of a city can hardly understand the pleasure with which the inhabitants of a secluded village hail any thing out of the usual quiet routine of existence. Consequently they would be likely to stare at the very idea of any one who was old enough to drive fast trotters, attend cock-fights, shoot balls over billiard-tables, and dance the polka, attaching any importance to such ordinary if not “decidedly vulgar” matters. But with all due deference to the dandies, I must still reiterate that we thought these three things of much consequence, and entitled to the place of events in our simple village calendar. The Fourth of July was a great affair, inasmuch as it was not only great in itself, but it opened as it were the gates of the decided summer, letting in upon us those long delicious hours when the sun’s eye begins to glance through its cloud lashes at three in the morning, and shoots up its light to wink and glimmer until nine in the evening. Camp Meeting was also very important—inherently of course—and also as coming as it did in October, it shut those same summer portals, and reminded us of the occasional pretence of Jack Frost, that jackall of winter, who comes prowling amidst our gardens some time before the stern roar of the old lion is heard. But General Training occurring in August, sandwiched between the two—the summit-level, so to speak, of the season—the acme—the apex—was, on the whole, the greatest event of the three. It was coupled with nothing else, either as herald of bright days, or reminder that those days were past. It had neither the brilliance of hope nor the fragrance of memory. It was therefore self-sustained—it shone by its own light. And full of the elements of enjoyment was it. So much bustle and noise—such rattle-te-bang topsy-turvy scenes—such unloosing of the elements of fun—such odd admixtures and jumblings together of objects, all broadly picturesque and ludicrous, did the day present, that no wonder it created such a sensation in our usually quiet and well behaved village. As the contrast last hinted at constituted one of its charms to me, I will commence by sketching the appearance of the village the evening before.