With this he blew out the last remaining light, and groped his way to his own humble sleeping-room, in the low attic story of the back kitchen. Here, however, he manifested no disposition to go to bed, but sitting down upon the side of his miserable pallet, he remained motionless and silent for fifteen or twenty minutes, when he began to soliloquize: “Jackass!--sleepy devil!--not wit enough to see what they are at in six weeks, eh? Barty Burt, you are one of small fishes, it is true; but, for all that, you needn't be walloped about at this rate, and bamboozled, and swallowed entirely up by the big ones of this court-and-king party. You know enough to take care of yourself; yes, and at the same time, you can be doing something towards paying these gentry for the beautiful compliments you have had from them to-night and at other times. The fact is, Bart, you are a rebel now--honestly one of them--you feel it in you, and you may as well let it out. So here goes for their meeting, if it is to be found, if I am hanged for it.” Having, in this whimsical manner, made a sort of manifesto of his principles and intentions, as if to give them, with himself, a more fixed and definite character, he now rose buttoned up his jacket, carefully raised the window of his room, let himself down to the roof of a shed beneath it, and from that descended to the ground, with the easy and rapid motions of a squirrel engaged in nut-gathering. Here he cast a furtive glance around him, and paused some moments, in apparent hesitation, respecting the course to be taken to find those of whom he was in quest. Soon, however, appearing to come to a determination, he struck out into the main street, and, with a quick step, proceeded on, perhaps a furlong, when he suddenly stopped short, and exclaimed, “Hold up, Bart. What did that sly judge say about searching in folks' sleighs, for--what was that word now?--But never mind, it meant guns. And what did the sheriff say about a dozen flint-and-steel men having come? Put that and that together now, Bart, and see if it don't mean that the only guns brought into town to-night are packed away in the straw, in the bottom of the sleighs of the court party understrappers? Let's go and mouse round their stopping-place a little, Bart. Perhaps you'll get more news to carry to the rebels,” he added, turning round and making towards the tavern at which those in the interests of the loyalists were known generally to put up.