"But he may have something to say to us."
"If he has we shall soon know it; but unless he makes a sign we had better keep on our way."
The seeming farmer paid no attention to the boys; that he saw them was evident, but he did not so much as raise his eyes after one quick glance, and Jacob understood that Enoch was wiser than he in such matters.
During this day it was as if the enemy was resting from the fatigue of merry-making; but few officers were to be seen on the streets until late in the afternoon, and at the different barracks there was even less than the ordinary amount of noise.
It was five o'clock when the boys turned from High into Second Street believing their day's work nearly done.
The sidewalk in front of the City Tavern was thronged with officers and civilians, and Jacob whispered:
"I wonder what is going on there? Some of the crowd appear to be excited."
"Suppose we pass the place singly, for by so doing we shall have a better chance to linger. You go ahead, and I'll follow when you are halfway through the crowd," Enoch suggested, and Jacob acted upon the idea at once.
Before he was well among the throng he heard that which caused him the liveliest surprise.
"So Lafayette's tattered retinue have abandoned their mud-holes, have they?" a gentleman who had just come up said to a group of officers, and one of the latter replied: