176 WARWICK WOODLANDS. 



bought hereabout; and, as for large ones, your land is so 

 confounded good, that a fellow must be a nabob to think 

 of buying." 



"Well, how would Jem Burt's place suit you. Archer?" 

 asked the fat man. "You knows it — jist a mile and a 

 half 'tother side Warwick, by the crick side? I guess it 

 will have to be sold anyhow next April; leastways the. 

 old man's dead and the heirs want the estate settled up 

 like." 



"Suit me!" cried Harry, "by George! it's just the thing, 

 if I recollect it rightly. But how much land is there?" 



"Twenty acres, I guess — not over twenty-five, no how." 



"And the house?" 



"Well, that wants fixin' some; and the bridge over the 

 crick's putty bad, too, it will want putty nigh a new one. 

 Why, the house is a story and a half like; and it's jist an 

 ep.try stret through the middle, and a parlor on one side 

 on't, and a kitchen on the t'other; and a chamber behind 

 both on 'em." 



"What can it be bought for, Tom?" 



"I guess three thousand dollars; twenty-five hundred, 

 maybe. It will go cheap, I reckon; I don't hear tell o' 

 no one lookin' at it." 



"What will it cost me more to fix it, think you ?" 



"Well, you see. Archer, the land's ben most darned 

 badly done by, this last three years, since old 'squire's ben 

 so low; and the bridge, that'll take a smart sum; and the 

 fences is putty much gone to rack; I guess it'll take hard 

 on to a thousand more to fix it up right, like you'd like to 

 have it, without doin' nuthin' at the house." 



"And fifteen hundred more for that and the stables. I 

 wish to heaven I had known this yesterday; or rather 

 before I came up hither," said Harry. 



"Why so?" asked the Commodore. 



"Why, as the deuce would have it, I told my broker to 

 invest six thousand, that I have got loose, in a good 

 mortgage, if he could find one, for five years; and I have 

 got no stocks that I can sell out ; all. that I have but this, 

 is on good bond and mortgage, in Boston, and little enough 

 of it. too." 



"Well, if that's all," said Forester, "we can run down 

 to-morrow, and you will be in time to stop him." 



