"The day of doom, most thought was come, Throughout New England's borders, The people scared, felt unprepared To obey the dreadful orders." In Connecticut the legislature was in session at Hartford. It was like night in the streets of this city and candles were burning in the windows of all the houses. Men grew anxious and uneasy. As the darkness became deeper, the House of Representatives adjourned, finding it impossible to transact any business. Soon after, a similar motion for adjournment was made in the Senate, or Council, as it was then called. By this time faces could scarcely be distinguished across the room and a dread had fallen on the assembly; "men's hearts failing them for fear and for looking after those things which were coming." Then up rose Honorable Abraham Davenport, a judge of Fairfield County and councilor from Stamford, a stern and upright man, strict in the discharge of his duty. "I am against adjournment," he said. "The Day of Judgment is either approaching or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause for adjournment; if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish, therefore, that candles may be brought." His strong words held the assembly. Its members rallied from their fears and, following his example, turned steadily to the transaction of the necessary business of the hour. "And there he stands in memory to this day, Erect, self-poised, a rugged face half seen Against a background of unnatural dark, A witness to the ages as they pass That simple duty hath no place for fear." WHITTIER. REFERENCES 1. Barber, J. W. _Connecticut Historical Collections_, J. W. Barber. New Haven, 1836. 2. _"The Dark Day." New England Magazine_, May, 1834. 3. Dexter, F. B. (editor). _The Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles_. Charles Scribner's Sons. New York, 1901. 4. Cutler, W. P. and J. P. _Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler_. Cincinnati, 1888. A FRENCH CAMP IN CONNECTICUT On the Green of the old town of Lebanon a mound is shown to-day on the spot where a large brick oven stood in the winter of 1781--an oven in which bread was baked for the soldiers of the American Revolutionary Army. These soldiers, who might have been seen almost any day that winter in their gay uniforms, crossing and recrossing the Green, or gathered in groups about the oven, were, strangely enough, not American soldiers, but French hussars belonging to the Duke de Lauzun's famous "Legion of Horse." France, being herself at war with England, had recently sent an army to America to help the colonies in their struggle against a common enemy, and the French commander-in-chief, the Count de Rochambeau, wrote from Newport, Rhode Island, to Governor Trumbull, of Connecticut, asking if the governor could provide winter quarters in Lebanon for a part of his forces--for the Duke de Lauzun and some of his Legion of Horse.