“Ditter—dickins!” exclaimed Tom Dunning, after listening a moment to the reading of the riot act, or proclamation, as it was usually called, as, with several others, he stood just within the entrance. “Now I wonder if they expect to rout a body of Green Mountain Boys with that sort of—ditter—ammunition?”
“There!” fiercely cried Patterson, as the reader concluded his task. “There, you d——d rascals, now disperse, or, by Heaven, I will blow a lane through ye!”
“Only—ditter—hear that!” again remarked the hunter, contemptuously, at the menace and profanity of the haughty officer. “Natural enough, though, mayhap, for a bag of wind to blow, if it does any thing. He is rather smart at—der—swearing, too, I think. But even at that, I guess he would have to haul in his horns a little, if old Ethan Allen was here, as I wish he was, to let off a few blasts of his—ditter—damnations at him.”
Captain Wright, after a brief consultation with the other leaders, now coming down from the court-room, opened the door, (Dunning and another strong-armed man having hold of it to guard against a rush,) and addressed the besiegers.
“Why is all this, gentlemen?” he said, in a respectful, but firm manner. “Are you come here for war? We are here for no such purpose, ourselves. We came with none other than peaceful intentions. And so long as we can say that, and say, also, above all, that we have come together with the approbation of the chief judge of your court, who has promised us a fair hearing of our grievances; and so long as, in direct violation of that judge's pledge to us, you appear here in arms, to intimidate us, let me assure you, we shall not disperse under your threats. We, however, will permit you to come in, if you will lay aside your arms; or we will hold a parley with you as you are.”
“D——n your parley!” exclaimed Gale, furiously. “D——n the parley with such d——d rascals as you are! I will hold no parley with such d——d rascals, but by this!” he added, drawing a pistol, and brandishing it towards his opponents.
“Ay! ay!” cried Redding, who, next to the sheriff and clerk, appeared to be the most violent and officious among the assailants: “talk about being here without arms, and for peace, do ye? when you have stolen a dozen of our guns, and have now got them in there among you. Pretty fellows, to talk about parley? We will give you a parley that will send you all to hell before morning!”
Wright here began a denial of the charge made by the last speaker; when he was interrupted by Dunning, who, jogging him said, in an undertone,—
“Let 'em-der—believe it. They are such—ditter—cowards, that the idea of a dozen guns among us will mike 'em more mannerly than all the preaching you could—ditter—do in a month.”
Concluding to profit by this suggestion of the sagacious hunter Wright now retired within doors, followed by the hisses, curses and all manner of abusive epithets, of the assailants.