The subject of an approaching town-meeting was beginning to loom dimly in the discussions of the village. One characteristic of the Yankee mind, as developed in those days, was the slowness and deliberation with which it arrived at any purpose or conclusion. This was not merely in general movements, but in particular ones also. Did the Widow Brown contemplate turning her back buttery into a sink-room, she forthwith went over to the nearest matrons of her vicinity, and announced that she was "talkin' about movin' her sink," and the movement in all its branches and bearings was discussed in private session. That was step No. 1. Then all the women at the next quilting, or tea-drinking, heard that Widow Brown was "talking about changing her sink," and _they_ talked about it. Then Seth Chickering, the neighborhood carpenter, was called into consultation, and came and investigated the premises, and reported--first to the widow and second to his wife, who told all the other women what "Seth, he said," etc. The _talking_ process continued indefinitely, unless some active Providential dispensation brought it to an end. The same process was repeated when Mrs. Slocum thought of investing in a new winter cloak; the idea in those days prevailing that a winter cloak was a thing never but once in a lifetime to be bought, and after that to endure for all generations, the important article must not be bought lightly or unadvisedly. When Deacon Dickenson proposed to build a new back parlor on his house and to re-shingle the roof, the talking and discussion lasted six months, and threw the whole neighborhood into commotion; carpenters came before daybreak and roosted on the fences, and at odd times as they found leisure, at all hours of the day, gathered together, and Seth Chickering took the opinions of Sam Parmelee and Jake Peters; and all Mrs. Dickenson's female friends talked about it, till every shingle, every shingle-nail and every drop of paint had received a separate consideration, and the bargain was, so to speak, whittled down to the finest possible point. Imagine the delicacies of discussion, then, that attended the moving of a schoolhouse at the public expense--a schoolhouse in which everybody in the neighborhood had a private and personal claim--and how like the proceedings of a bull in a china shop was the advocacy of a champion like Zeph Higgins, and one may see how infinitely extended in this case might be the area of "talkin' about movin' that air schoolhouse," and how hopelessly distant any decision. The thing had already risen on the horizon of Deacon Dickenson's store, like one of those puzzling stars or fractiously disposed heavenly bodies that seem created to furnish astronomers with something to talk about. The fateful period was again coming round; the spring town-meeting was at hand, and more than one had been heard to say that "Ef that air schoolhouse hed to be moved, it oughter be done while the sleddin' was good."