There were already several there, and as Lemuel's eyes accustomed themselves to the light that came in through the little panes at the sides of the roof, he could see that they were women; and by and by he saw that two of them were the saucy girls who had driven him from his seat in the Common that day, and laughed so at him. They knew him too, and one of them set up a shrill laugh. “Hello, Johnny! That you? You don't say so? What you up for _this_ time? Going down to the Island? Well, give us a call there! Do be sociable! Ward 11's the address.” The other one laughed, and then swore at the first for trying to push her off the seat. Lemuel broke out involuntarily in all the severity that was native to him. “You ought to be ashamed of yourselves.” This convulsed the bold things with laughter. When they could get their breath, one of them said, “Pshaw! I know what he's up for: preaching on the Common. Say, young feller! don't you want to hold a prayer-meetin' here?” They burst into another shriek of laughter, so wild and shrill that the driver rapped on the roof, and called down, “Dry up in there!” “Oh, you mind your horses, and we'll look after the passengers. Go and set on his knee, Jen, and cheer him up a little.” Lemuel sat in a quiver of abhorrence. The girl appealed to remained giggling beside her companion. “I--I pity ye!” said Lemuel. The Irishwoman had not stopped bewailing herself, and imploring right and left an easy doom. She now addressed herself wholly to Lemuel, whose personal dignity seemed to clothe him with authority in her eyes. She told him about her children, left alone with no one to look after them; the two little girls, the boy only three years old. When the van stopped at a station to take in more passengers, she tried to get out--to tell the gentlemen at the office about it, she said. After several of these halts they stopped at the basement of a large stone building, that had a wide flight of steps in front, and columns, like the church at Willoughby Pastures, only the church steps were wood, and the columns painted pine. Here more officers took charge of them, and put them in a room where there were already twenty-five or thirty other prisoners, the harvest of the night before; and presently another van-load was brought in. There were many women among them, but here there was no laughing or joking as there had been in the van. Scarcely any one spoke, except the Irishwoman, who crept up to an officer at the door from time to time, and begged him to tell the judge to let her have it easy this time. Lemuel could not help seeing that she and most of the others were familiar with the place. Those two saucy jades who had mocked him were silent, and had lost their bold looks.