"Well, he didn't," said Huldy, now thoroughly excited, "he came with me, and he's outside now talking with Hiram about the barge." "Why don't he come in?" asked Bob Wood. "P'r'aps he's bashful." "If he didn't have no more common sense than you've got," retorted Huldy, "he'd have to go to bed as soon as he had eaten his supper." The laugh that followed this remark so incensed Wood that he answered coarsely, "I never saw one of those city chaps who knew B from a bull's foot." "Perhaps he'll teach you the difference some day," remarked Huldy, sarcastically. "Well, I guess not," said Wood with a sneer; "'less he can put two b's in able." Further altercation was stopped by the sudden entrance of Mr. Strout, who quickly ascended the platform and called the society to order. It must be acknowledged that the Professor had a good knowledge of music and thoroughly understood the very difficult art of directing a mixed chorus of uncultivated voices. With him enthusiasm was more important than a strict adherence to quavers and semiquavers, and what was lost in fine touches was more than made up in volume of tone. Again, the Professor paid strict attention to business at rehearsals, and the progress of the society in musical knowledge had been very marked. So it is not to be wondered at that the various numbers allotted to the chorus on the next evening's programme were gone through quickly and to the evident satisfaction of the leader. The last number to be taken up was an original composition, written and composed by the singing-master himself, and during its rehearsal his enthusiasm reached its highest pitch. At the conclusion of the chorus, which had been rendered with remarkable spirit, the Professor darted from one-end of the platform to the other, crying out, "Bravo! Fust rate! Do it again! That'll fetch 'em!" After several repetitions of the chorus, each one given with increasing spirit and volume, the Professor threw down his baton and said: "That'll do. You're excused until to-morrow night, seven o'clock sharp at Eastborough Town Hall. I guess the barge has just drove up and we'd better be gittin' ready for our sleigh ride." Miss Tilly James, who had acted as accompanist on the tin-panny old piano, was putting up her music. The Professor, with his face wreathed in smiles, walked up to her and said, "I tell you what, Miss James, that last composition of mine is bang up. One of these days, when the 'Star Spangled Banner,' 'Hail Columbia,' and 'Marching through Georgia' are laid upon the top shelf and all covered with dust, one hundred million American freemen will be singing Strout's great national anthem, 'Hark, and hear the Eagle Scream.' What do you think of that prophecy?" "I think," said Miss James, turning her pretty face towards him, her black eyes snapping with fun, "that if conceit was consumption, there'd be another little green grave in the cemetery with O. Strout on the headstone."