The village was composed of the usual ingredients, in the usual proportions. Law, drygoods, liquor, blacksmithing, carpentry, education, painting and glazing, medicine, dentistry, tinware, and other comforts of civilization, were all to be had on reasonable terms. There were four churches with rival steeples, and two taverns with rival signs. The village contained everything that any reasonable man could ask for, except a barber's shop. It takes a good-sized town to support a barber's shop.
As they marched into the village, they were conscious of attracting general attention. Men looked out of the doors, women out of the windows, and boys had begun to fall in procession behind.
"Them are the performers," said one boy to another "Wonder what that feller with the big hat does?" observed a second. "Turns the crank, guess," was the response.
Patching pulled his hat farther over his eyes, and smiled gloomily at Tiffles, "They little think who I am," he murmured.
"What a solemncholy mug that tall chap's got," said another youthful citizen. This made Marcus try to laugh genially at the boys. But in vain.
"Say, Bill, isn't that little feller's shirt out o' jail?"
Tiffles made a personal application of this remark. It was his constant misfortune to suffer rents in portions of his garments where their existence was least likely to be discovered by himself. As he could not publicly verify the suggestion of the impertinent small boy, he buttoned his coat tightly about him.
How their identity with the panorama of Africa had been established, was a mystery. Small boys divine secrets by instinct, as birds find food and water.
The two taverns were the National House and the United States Hotel. Although the signs were large and clean, the taverns were small and dirty. There was no choice between them, except in the fact that the United States Hotel was directly opposite Washington Hall. Therefore the adherents of the panorama cast their fortunes with that place of entertainment for man and beast--particularly beast.
Mr. Thomas Pigworth, the landlord, was seated on the stoop of his hostelry, discoursing of national politics to a small group of his fellow citizens, who were performing acrobatic feats with chairs in a circle about him. Pigworth was a justice of the peace, and was always dressed in his best clothes, so as to perform his judicial functions at a moments notice, with dignity and ease. He was tall, thin, baldheaded. T.J. Childon, landlord of the "National," said hard things, as in duty bound, of his rival. Among others, that he had kept himself lean by running so hard for office for the last ten years. To which slander Pigworth retorted, that Childon was fat (which was true--a fine, plump figure was Childon's) only because he ate everything in his house, and left nothing for his customers.
The three newcomers mounted the rotten wooden steps to the stoop. Mr. Pigworth left his group of auditors, came forward, and received them with the affability of a retired statesman.
"The landlord?" asked Tiffles.
"I keep the hotel," said Pigworth, with a smile which intimated that he kept it for amusement rather than profit.
"Room and board for three of us?" asked Tiffles.
"Certainly," said Pigworth, with the air of a man who was doing them a favor. "Ef you want only one apartment, I can give you the one occupied last week by the Hon. Mr. Podhammer. You have heard of him?"
"Of course," responded Tiffles, to cut short the conversation.
"He spoke in Washington Hall, there, on the Cons'tution. He is smart on some things, but THE CONS'TUTION he doesn't understand--not a word of it. I told him so."
Tiffles was about to ask why, if the Hon. Mr. Podhammer didn't understand a word of the Constitution, he had the audacity to lecture on it; when he remembered that it was no uncommon thing for lecturers to talk of what they don't understand--himself of Africa, for instance.
"Be good enough to show us the room," said he.
"I say, Judge" (Pigworth, being a justice of the peace, was universally styled thus), cried a voice from the group, "do you, or do you not, indorse my sentiments?"
Pigworth turned majestically, and spoke like an oracle:
"I do not indorse your sentiments. I wish it distinctly understood, that I do not indorse them. I indorse nothing but the Cons'tution. That instrument I indorse to any extent. Are you satisfied now?"
This speech was hailed by cries of "Good! good!" "That's so!" "Sound doctrine, that!" "The Judge knows what's what!" Only one person, the questioner, a young man with a preternatural head, was unappeased.
"A single word more," said this young man. "Do you, or do you not, subscribe to my views on the Homestead Law?"
Pigworth looked at the three comers as if to say, "Mark how I crush him now." Then, pointing his long right arm at the rash youth, he replied, slowly, but with fearful distinctness: "I do not subscribe to your views. Sooner would I lose this right arm than subscribe to them. There is only one view that I subscribe to. That view to which I subscribe (the Judge spoke with increased dignity here, and rose on his toes)--that view is found in the Cons'tution. You would do well to study the Cons'tution, my young friend."
This withering rebuke was greeted with shouts and clapping of hands from all but the young man, who muttered something about humbug, and looked glum.
The landlord had another excoriating remark, which he might have flung at the young man and finished him up, but he magnanimously forbore.
"Now, my friends," said the landlord, patronizingly. He ushered them into a dirty entry, and piloted the way up stairs.
"From New York, I suppose?" said the landlord. "Any political news?"
"Really, sir, we don't meddle with politics," replied Tiffles, sharply.
The landlord looked at him with an expression of pity "Oh! to be sure not. You belong to the pannyrama. I recolleck that the last circus folks that come here never talked about politics. Are you Professor Wesley?"
"I am," said Tiffles.
"I merely wanted to say," continued the landlord, "that six of my lodgers are goin' to the pannyrama on my recommendation. I have a wife, sister-in-law and five children."
Tiffles took the hint. "I will hand you a complimentary ticket for yourself and family," said he.
"Oh, no! by no means!" replied the landlord. "I wouldn't think of taking it."
Mr. Pigworth then ushered his guests into the large, uncomfortable apartment known as the "best room" in all country hotels. The ceiling was low; there were three windows with small panes, the sashes of which rattled in the wind; a rag carpet covered the floor; an old bureau, topped off with a dirty white cloth, a rickety table similarly draped, four cane-bottomed chairs, and a huge wooden spitbox filled with sawdust, stood at intervals around. Two single beds occupied opposite corners.
With reference to the beds, Mr. Pigworth remarked:
"Podhammer and Gineral Chetley slept in that air one. Colonel Hockensacker and Judge Waterfield in t'other. There was four other mattresses put down here that night, each of 'em with two of our most distinguished citizens on it. That convention was worth to me a good hundred dollars."
With every respect for the precedent established by Podhammer and associates, Marcus Wilkeson preferred to sleep alone, as he had done for twenty years. He privately expressed to the landlord a desire for one of the mattresses which had done duty during the convention.
The landlord smiled, evidently regarding the request as eccentric and unreasonable, but nodded "All right." As for Tiffles and Patching, having shared the same couch several nights during the incubation of the panorama, the problem of how to distribute three men among two beds gave them no concern. Pigworth then retired.
Marcus Wilkeson's first act was to open the windows, and mix some fresh air with the damp and mouldy atmosphere of the apartment. Patching's first act was to light his pipe, and throw himself on the nearest bed for a smoke. Tiffles's first act was to inspect the rent which the impertinent small boy had discovered, and make temporary repairs with a pin. Having done these things, and arranged their toilets hastily in a mirror with a crack running through it like a streak of lightning, the three adventurers sallied forth, and crossed the street to Washington Hall.