"Professor Brownell," John called into it. "I want to make you acquainted with Mr. Palmerston. Mr. Palmerston is a young man from the East, a student at Cambridge--no, Oxford"-- "Ann Arbor," interrupted the young man, eagerly. Dysart ignored the interruption. "He's out here for his health." The stranger nodded toward the young man approvingly, and dropped the trumpet as if he had heard enough. "How do you do, Mr. Palmerston?" he said, reaching down to clasp the young fellow's slim white hand. "I'm glad to meet a scholar in these wilds." Palmerston blushed a helpless pink, and murmured politely. The stranger dismounted from the wagon with the awkwardness of age and avoirdupois. John Dysart stood just behind his guest, describing him as if he were a panorama:-- "I never saw his beat. He talks just like a book. He's filled me chuck-full of science on the way up. He knows all about the inside of the earth from the top crust to China. Ask him something about his machine, and get him started." Palmerston glanced inquiringly toward the trumpet. The stranger raised it to his ear and leaned graciously toward him. "Mr. Dysart is mistaken," called Palmerston, in the high, lifeless voice with which we all strive to reconcile the deaf to their affliction; "I am a Western man, from Ann Arbor." "Better still, better still," interrupted the newcomer, grasping his hand again; "you'll be broader, more progressive--'the heir of all the ages,' and so forth. I was denied such privileges in my youth. But nature is an open book, 'sermons in stones.'" He turned toward the wagon and took out a small leather valise, handling it with evident care. Dysart winked at the young man, and pointed toward the satchel. "Jawn," called Mrs. Dysart seethingly, from the kitchen door, "what's the trouble?" John's facial contortions stopped abruptly, as if the mainspring had snapped. He took off his hat and scratched his head gingerly with the tip of his little finger. He had a round, bald head, with a fringe of smooth, red-brown hair below the baldness that made it look like a filbert. "I'm coming, Emeline," he called, glancing hurriedly from the two men to the vicinity of his wife's voice, as if anxious to bisect himself mentally and leave his hospitality with his guest. "I'll look after Professor Brownell," said Palmerston; "he can step into my tent and brush up." Dysart's countenance cleared. "Good," he said eagerly, starting on a quick run toward the kitchen door. When he was half-way there he turned and put up his hand again. "Draw him out!" he called in a stentorian whisper. "You'd ought to hear him talk; it's great. Get him started about his machine."