'Not much beholden,' said the stranger drily. 'The colonel occasionally
boards packet-ships, I have heard, to glean the latest information
for his journal; and he occasionally brings strangers to board here, I
believe, with a view to the little percentage which attaches to those
good offices; and which the hostess deducts from his weekly bill. I
don't offend you, I hope?' he added, seeing that Martin reddened.
'My dear sir,' returned Martin, as they shook hands, 'how is that
possible! to tell you the truth, I--am--'
'Yes?' said the gentleman, sitting down beside him.
'I am rather at a loss, since I must speak plainly,' said Martin,
getting the better of his hesitation, 'to know how this colonel escapes
being beaten.'
'Well! He has been beaten once or twice,' remarked the gentleman
quietly. 'He is one of a class of men, in whom our own Franklin, so
long ago as ten years before the close of the last century, foresaw
our danger and disgrace. Perhaps you don't know that Franklin, in very
severe terms, published his opinion that those who were slandered
by such fellows as this colonel, having no sufficient remedy in the
administration of this country's laws or in the decent and right-minded
feeling of its people, were justified in retorting on such public
nuisances by means of a stout cudgel?'
'I was not aware of that,' said Martin, 'but I am very glad to know
it, and I think it worthy of his memory; especially'--here he hesitated
again.
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