Two or three times a day this
quiet is broken by the sudden thunder from a quarry, where the workmen
are blasting rocks; and a peal of thunder sounds strangely in such a
green, sunny, and quiet landscape, with the blue sky brightening the
river.
I have not seen much of the people. There have been, however, several
incidents which amused me, though scarcely worth telling. A passionate
tavern-keeper, quick as a flash of gunpowder, a nervous man, and
showing in his demeanor, it seems, a consciousness of his infirmity of
temper. I was a witness of a scuffle of his with a drunken guest. The
tavern-keeper, after they were separated, raved like a madman, and in a
tone of voice having a drolly pathetic or lamentable sound mingled with
its rage, as if he were lifting up his voice to weep. Then he jumped
into a chaise which was standing by, whipped up the horse, and drove off
rapidly, as if to give his fury vent in that way.
On the morning of the Fourth of July, two printer's apprentice-lads,
nearly grown, dressed in jackets and very tight pantaloons of check,
tight as their skins, so that they looked like harlequins or
circus-clowns, yet appeared to think themselves in perfect propriety,
with a very calm and quiet assurance of the admiration of the town.
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