sound asleep by the side of the tortoise-shell cat. Probably he will think of some particular milking-time when the calm, contented serenity of the barn-yard was suddenly disturbed by the unexpected descent in its midst of a neighboring peacock, who, apparently unconscious of the consternation produced by his entry, proceeded proudly to spread his dazzling plumage to convince every one, from Uncle Cy, on the milking-stool, and mild-eyed Bess, down to the white fan-tailed dove, that he was—It.
Conjure up the picture—the peacock at milking-time in the farm-yard; thus Addicks came to Boston—though it is far from my intention to identify the bucolic background I have drawn with the Hub of the Universe.
Boston, up to this time, had been singularly free from the mushroom variety of millionaire which had sprung up overnight in such numbers in New York and Philadelphia. Proudly defiant of a product so alien to all her traditions, her citizens would have sworn that no votary of modern high finance could exist over one curfew-toll within her gates. For Boston had her own financial eminence, of a character in keeping with the chill conditions of conservatism and rectitude appropriate to the metropolis of the New England conscience. She had her Stock Exchange, her numerous great corporations, her scores of single and multimillionaires, and it was her boast that her capital had played the greatest legitimate part in the country's growth. She had furnished a large percentage of the money which had created our vast Western railway system; she had found and made the superb copper-mines of Michigan and Montana, and in all parts of the land branches of her sturdy institutions were vitally assisting the miracle of America's development. Notwithstanding what these wide-flung enterprises imply of commercial push and audacity, Boston, at the time Addicks discovered gas there, was one of the most trusting wealth-investing communities in the world. She had her simple rules of business conduct which years of usage had consecrated into all-powerful