A dozen persons were crossing the
street. He knew every one of them at sight. Of course there was no
forgetting old Dan Sears, with whom he had forty times gone a-fishing;
nor Phil Sanborn, who had stood behind the counter with him two years
at the old store. Though Phil had grown stout, there was the same look.
There was the old store, too, looking exactly as it did when he went
away, the sign a little more worn in the gilding. He seemed to smell the
mingled odors of rum, salt-fish, and liquorice, with which every beam
and rafter was permeated. And there was old Walsh going home drunk this
minute! with a salt mackerel, as usual, for his family-dinner.
He wrote a short note as he dressed and shaved leisurely. The note was
to Dorcas, and only said,--"Meet me under the old pear-tree before
sunset tonight,"--and was signed with his initials. This note he at
first placed on the little mantel-shelf in plain sight, so that he
should not forget to take it down-stairs when he went to breakfast.
Afterwards he put it into his pocket-book.
His dress----But the dress of 1811 has not arrived at the picturesque,
and could never be classical under any circumstances. He finished his
toilet, and went into the dining-room just as everybody else had dined,
and asked the landlord what he could have for breakfast. Even then, the
landlord hardly looked curious.
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