"Look-a-here, you shouldn't speak to a fellow till you've been introduced," said that wicked Fred behind me. "Mr. Flutter, allow me to make you acquainted with Mr. Flutter. He's anxious to take a little walk with you."
It was so; I had been talking to myself in a four-foot looking-glass.
I did not feel like staying for the ice-cream and kissing-plays, but had a sly hunt for my hat, and took leave of the tea-party about the eighth of a second afterward.
CHAPTER IV.
HE DOES HIS DUTY AS A CITIZEN.
Babbletown began to be very lively as soon as the weather got cool, the fall after I came home. We had a singing-school once a week, a debating society that met every Wednesday evening, and then we had sociables, and just before Christmas a fair. All the other young men had a good time. Every day, when some of them dropped in the store for a chat and a handful of raisins, they would aggravate me by asking:
"Aren't we having a jolly winter of it, John?"
I never had a good time. I never enjoyed myself like other folks. I spent enough money and made enough good resolutions, but something always occurred to destroy my anticipated pleasure. I can't hear a lyceum or debating society mentioned to this day, without feeling "cold-chills" run down my spine.