"He isn't going to say anything more; he's tired. But if any man don't
think he's got his dollar's worth, let him walk up to the door and the
ticket-agent will refund him his money."
The crowd laughed, and some one shouted: "Good for you, Reub!"
Camp continued: "But our friend here will shake the hand of any man,
woman, or child that wants to speak to him; and you needn't wipe it on the
grass first, either. He's a _man_! And I want to say that he's going to
spend the next week with us, at my mother's house, and we shall be glad to
have you call."
The crowd, the rustic and ruder part of it, cheered and cheered till the
mountain echoes answered; then a railroader called for three times three,
with a tiger, and got it. The guests of the hotel broke away and went
toward the house over the long shadows of the meadow. The lower classes
pressed forward, on Camp's invitation.
"Well, did you ever hear a more disgusting rigmarole?" asked Mrs. Makely,
as our little group halted indecisively about her.
"With all those imaginary commonwealths to draw upon, from Plato, through
More, Bacon, and Campanella, down to Bellamy and Morris, he has
constructed the shakiest effigy ever made of old clothes stuffed with
straw," said the professor.
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