"No; they might talk to you and take some of my time with you away from

me." Her eyes sparkled into his for the merest fraction of a second, and

she laughed half mockingly. Then she dropped his lapel and they proceeded.

She did not put the white rose in her belt, but carried it.

The Square was heaving with a jostling, goodnatured, happy, and constantly

increasing crowd that overflowed on Main Street in both directions; and

the good nature of this crowd was augmented in the ratio that its size

increased. The streets were a confusion of many colors, and eager faces

filled every window opening on Main Street or the Square. Since nine

o'clock all those of the courthouse had been occupied, and here most of

the damsels congregated to enjoy the spectacle of the parade, and their

swains attended, gallantly posting themselves at coignes of less vantage

behind the ladies. Some of the faces that peeped from the dark, old court-

house windows were pretty, and some of them were not pretty; but nearly

all of them were rosy-cheeked, and all were pleasant to see because of the

good cheer they showed. Some of the gallants affected the airy and easy,

entertaining the company with badinage and repartee; some were openly

bashful. Now and then one of the latter, after long deliberation,

constructed a laborious compliment for his inamorata, and, after advancing

and propounding half of it, again retired into himself, smit with a

blissful palsy. Nearly all of them conversed in tones that might have

indicated that they were separated from each other by an acre lot or two.

Here and there, along the sidewalk below, a father worked his way through

the throng, a licorice-bedaubed cherub on one arm, his coat (borne with

long enough) on the other; followed by a mother with the other children

hanging to her skirts and tagging exasperatingly behind, holding red and

blue toy balloons and delectable batons of spiral-striped peppermint in

tightly closed, sadly sticky fingers.

A thousand cries rent the air; the strolling mountebanks and gypsying

booth-merchants; the peanut vendors; the boys with palm-leaf fans for

sale; the candy sellers; the popcorn peddlers; the Italian with the toy

balloons that float like a cluster of colored bubbles above the heads of

the crowd, and the balloons that wail like a baby; the red-lemonade man,

shouting in the shrill voice that reaches everywhere and endures forever:

"Lemo! Lemo! Ice-cole lemo! Five cents, a nickel, a half-a-dime, the

twentiethpotofadollah! Lemo! Ice-cole lemo!"--all the vociferating

harbingers of the circus crying their wares. Timid youth, in shoes covered

with dust through which the morning polish but dimly shone, and

unalterably hooked by the arm to blushing maidens, bought recklessly of

peanuts, of candy, of popcorn, of all known sweetmeats, perchance; and

forced their way to the lemonade stands; and there, all shyly, silently

sipped the crimson-stained ambrosia. Everywhere the hawkers dinned, and

everywhere was heard the plaintive squawk of the toy balloon.




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