This he brought down-stairs with him. He
began to hope that he might get the boat after all.
The squire, in dressing-gown and slippers, sat in a comfortable
armchair, while John in a consequential manner read his rejected
essay. It was superficial and commonplace, and abundantly marked
with pretension, but to the squire's warped judgment it seemed to
have remarkable merit.
"It does you great credit, John," said he emphatically. "I don't
know what sort of an essay young Frost wrote, but I venture to
say it was not as good. If he's anything like his father, he is
an impertinent jackanapes."
John pricked up his ears, and listened attentively.
"He grossly insulted me at the town meeting to-day, and I sha'n't
soon forget it. It isn't for his interest to insult a man who has
the power to annoy him that I possess."
"Haven't you got a mortgage on his farm?"
"Yes, and at a proper time I shall remind him of it. But to come
back to your own affairs. What was the prize given to young
Frost?"
"A blue-and-gold copy of Whittier's Poems, in two volumes.
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