Like starlight in a forest pool;
She may have said, “Take heart, dear one!”
She may have said, “Go on, thou fool!”
—The “Quaker Wooing.”
Some of the older voters in Palermo relate that once a constable obeyed the injunction to post a caucus call “in a public place” by sticking the paper on the wall under the roller towel in Asa Brickett’s store. It is further related that no one heard of that caucus until it was over, except the few chosen ones let into the secret.
But the warrant for the annual town meeting in Palermo that March, done in the best roundhand of the second selectman, one copy tacked onto the townhouse door, another copy pasted up in the post-office, another nailed to the round centre post in Brickett’s store, received the careful attention of every voter.
Each sheet was banded by several broad smooches that distinguished the articles in the warrant to which especial public interest attached. Each voter, as he read these, carefully ran his finger along the lines across the paper, so as not to miss a word, for it was understood that the new faction in town politics, captained by Hiram Look, had obtained the insertion of those articles.
One was, “To see if the town will vote a sum of money for the support of the ‘Look Cornet Brass Band,’ or act anything thereto.”
Popular interest in this measure was shown by a fair amount of discoloration on the paper.
A deeper tint attached to Article 15: “To see if the town will vote to pay its floating indebtedness, statement of complete amount of same to be furnished the voters from his books by the town treasurer prior to the call for the ballot.”