A " HOOSIER " IN SEARCH OF JUSTICE. 207 



Around the interior walls of this romantic-looking 

 place may be found an extensive library, where all 

 the " statutes," from Moses' time down to the present 

 day, are ranged side by side ; in these musty books the 

 owner revels day and night, digesting " digests," and 

 growing the while sallow, with indigestion. 



On the evening-time of a fine summer's day, the sage 

 lawyer might have been seen walled in with books and 

 manuscripts, his eye full of thought, and his bald high 

 forehead sparkling with the rays of the setting sun, as 

 if his genius was making itself visible to the senses ; 

 page after page he searched, musty parchments were 

 scanned, an expression of care and anxiety indented 

 itself on the stern features of his face, and with a sigh 

 of despair he desisted from his labors, uttering aloud 

 his feelings that he feared his case was a hopeless one. 



Then he renewed again his mental labor with tenfold 

 vigor, making the very silence, with which he pursued 

 his thoughts, ominous, as if a .spirit were in his presence. 



The door of the lawyer's office opened, there pressed 

 forward the tall, gaunt figure of a man, a perfect model 

 of physical power and endurance — a western flatboatmau. 

 The lawyer heeded not his presence, and started as if 

 from a dream, as the har.sh tones of inquiry, grated upon 

 his ear, of, 



*' Does a 'Squire live here ? " 



*• They call me so," was the reply, as soon as he 

 had recovered from his astonishment. 



