The day being fixed for the ceremony of cutting down the first tree in the market-place-to-be of Judiville, Mr. Hoskins took upon himself to make every kind of befitting and proper preparation. He communicated with nobody as to his intentions, but went about from morning to night, sometimes with the carpenters, sometimes with the blacksmith. Robin alone was in his confidence; and for two days we saw but little of him, so busy was he too about the preparations.

I cannot deny that I was in the mean time as curious to know what they were doing as Bailie Waft himself, who had never got such a job in hand from the hour of his birth. He did nothing all day long but wander from Dan to Beersheba, and speak of the doing that was to be done to every body he met, enquiring what it could possibly be that kept Mr. Hoskins so constantly afoot: at last he happened to get a glimpse behind the curtain, and came primed and proud with his discovery to the store, where I was longing for information.

“Do you know, Mr. Todd,” said he, “what they can have propounded by yon great iron hoops that the blacksmith is making; for he, like the rest, is as unanswering as his own bellows; what can they be for? and then the big log that the carpenters are boring, and which I thought, and I dare say every body thought, was for a pump: they never put their wumble farther into it than a foot or so, and then they sawed off the bored piece, and began to bore again, till they have made seven curiosities out of it, which I do not understand.”

“I’ll lay my lugs, Mr. Waft,” was my reply, “they are cannon, and the iron hoops are to keep them from bursting.”

Sure enough it proved so, and Robin was busy making cartridges out of a keg of powder for them.