Ike said "it would hold him—couldn't break it no how—it was made by the law to catch just such chaps with."
"Wal," said Mrs. Fizzle, "if the law made it, I'm 'fraid on't. I've hearn tell how folks creep through holes the law leaves. I don't like your scorpus, as you call it."
Squire Longbow rose. "He felt it his duty to say, that a writ of habus scorpus would hold anything on airth. It was one of the biggest writs in all nater. He could hold all Clewes' grocery with one on 'em. He felt it his duty further to say this as a magistrate, who was bound by his oath to take care of the law."
Mrs. Fizzle "thought that would do. She had great 'spect for the Squire's opinion—and she now thought she'd go in for the meetin'."
Sile Bates said, "for his part, he thought the meetin' was getting a good deal mixed. 'Every tub orter stand on its own bottom,' as the Apostle Paul, Shakspeare, John Bunyan, or some other person said. We can't do everything all at onst; if we try, we can't make the Millennium come until 'tis time for't. We can kinder straighten up matters—hold onto the public morals a little more—and give edication a punch ahead. But who knows anything about the sciences in Puddleford? and who can lecter? 'When the blind lead the blind,' as the newspapers say, 'they all go head over heels into the ditch.' Great Cæsar Augustus, Mr. President, jist think of a lecter on 'stronomy, that etarnal science, which no man can lay his hands on, which the human intellect gets at by figuring. Just think of Bigelow Van Slyck, Ike Turtle, or you, Mr. President, measuring the distance to the stars. Don't it make your head swim, to think on't? He wouldn't say that the Squire couldn't lay down the law for the people, 'cause he made most on't, and ought to know it by heart. (The Squire gave a loud cough, and straightened himself in his seat.) As for licker, he always was agin it, that is, he never touch'd it except in haying, harvesting, husking, and occasionally, a little along, between, when he didn't feel right. He s'posed he was a strict temperance man—was secretary of a teetotal society once, but it died out for want of funds to keep up lights and fires. He hop'd this meetin' wouldn't get so much on its shoulders, as to break down 'fore it got started."
There were several more speeches and suggestions made. There were two or three on the floor at once, several times, during the progress of business. Order was out of the question. A course of lectures was finally decided upon, and the meeting adjourned. The reader will not forget that the end had in view by this rough, deliberate body was noble; and, in their own way, they moved along steadily towards it. Such a people do not forget their duty, however ludicrously the discharge of it may be at first.
Looking back from the present, over a period of ten years, at the proceedings of this meeting and its results, I feel quite disposed to write down Squire Longbow, Ike Turtle, and Sile Bates, among the philanthropists of the age.