And hereupon she shifted the needles in her knitting, and, smoothing down the big blue stocking-leg over her knee, cast a glance at the Deacon which signified command. The dame was thoroughly mistress in her own household, as well as in the households of not a few of her neighbors. Long before, the meek, mild-mannered little man who was her husband had by her active and resolute negotiation been made a deacon of the parish,--for which office he was not indeed ill-fitted, being religiously disposed, strict in his observance of all duties, and well-grounded in the Larger Catechism. He had, moreover, certain secular endowments which were even more marked,--among them, a wonderful instinct at a bargain, which had been polished by Dame Tourtelot's superior address to a wonderful degree of sharpness; and by reason of this the less respectful of the townspeople were accustomed to say, "The Deacon is very small at home, but great in a trade." Not that the Deacon could by any means be called an avaricious or miserly man: he had always his old Spanish milled quarter ready for the contribution-box upon Collection-Sundays; and no man in the parish brought a heavier turkey to the parson's larder on donation-days: but he could no more resist the sharpening of a bargain than he could resist a command of his wife. He talked of a good trade to the old heads up and down the village street as a lad talks of a new toy. "Squire," he would say, addressing a neighbor on the Common, "what do you s'pose I paid for that brindle ye'rlin' o' mine? Give us a guess." "Waael, Deacon, I guess you paid about ten dollars." "Only eight!" the Deacon would say, with a smile that was fairly luminous,--"and a pootty likely critter I call it for eight dollars." "Five hogs this year," (in this way the Deacon was used to soliloquize,)--"I hope to make 'em three hundred apiece. The price works up about Christmas: Deacon Simmons has sold his'n at five,--distillery-pork; that's sleezy, wastes in bilin'; folks know it: mine, bein' corn-fed, ought to bring half a cent more,--and say, for Christmas, six; that'll give a gain of a cent,--on five hogs, at three hundred apiece, will be fifteen dollars. That'll pay half my pew-rent, and leave somethin' over for Almiry, who's always wantin' fresh ribbons about New-Year's." The Deacon cherished a strong dread of formal visits to the parsonage: first, because it involved his Sunday toilet, in which he was never easy, except at conference or in his pew at the meeting-house; and next, because he counted it necessary on such occasions to give a Scriptural garnish to his talk, in which attempt he almost always, under the authoritative look of the parson, blundered into difficulty. Yet Tourtelot, in obedience to his wife's suggestion, and primed with a text from Matthew, undertook the visit of condolence,--and, being a really kind-hearted man, bore himself well in it. Over and over the good parson shook his hand in thanks.