Every minute the crowd increased: men and women, well dressed, sober-looking, crying, "Shame! shame!" and topping by a head the little squad of undersized soldiers (for the regular army was then recruited almost entirely from foreigners) who marched hurriedly forward, with eyes cast straight before and downward, and dressed in that shabby blue that ten years later was to pour southward in serried column, all American then, to free those slaves whom now they hunted down.
"To the Court House! To the Court House!" cried the mob.
"It's that fellow Simms," said Mr. Bowdoin, but was interrupted by sounds as of a portly person running downstairs; and they saw the front door fly open and Mrs. Bowdoin run across the street, her cap-strings streaming in the air.
"By Jove, if Abolitionism can make your grandma run, I'll forgive it a lot!" cried Mr. Bowdoin.
"Do you know the facts, sir?" suggested Harley.
"No, nor don't want to," said Mr. Bowdoin. "I know that we are jeopardizing the grandest experiment in free government the world has ever seen for a few African darkies that we didn't bring here, and have already made Christians of, and a d—d sight more comfortable than they ever were at home. But come, let's go over, or I believe your grandma will be attacking the United States army all by herself!"
But the rescue was made unnecessary by the return of that lady, panting.
"Now, sir," gasped Mrs. Bowdoin, "I hope you're satisfied, that foreign Hessians control the laws of Massachusetts!"
"I am always glad to see the flag of my country sustained," said Mr. Bowdoin dryly; "though we don't fly it from our club."
"I think you misunderstand, sir," ventured Harley. "This Simms is arrested by the Boston sheriff for stabbing a man; and the Southerners have got the federal commissioner to refuse to give him up to justice."