Excerpt from David Allen: A Village Tale

Then, Mr. Graham always would wear a white hat, with a brim turned up with green beaver. Such a. Queer hat had never before been seen in Greenfield within the memory of man, and almost everybody in the village grinned and jeered when they first saw this queer hat, while the boys hooted and shouted after it and its we arer as they passed together along the read. And when it was found that, in spite of grins and laughter, Mr. Graham would wear his white and green hat, his con duct was looked upon as an insult to the taste and good sense of all Greenfield so, of course, the villagers took offence at this.

There was another cause for the ill-will of the youths and boys of the village to this gen tleman. Before he had bought and built upon the six acre meadow, it had been their regular play ground: and they did not see what right Mr. Graham, or any other Mister or Master had to deprive them of it.

To begin the story again, therefore, the dozen or more boys who, on that fine spring evening, were playing and romping in front of the new house, seemed highly delighted to find that Mr. Graham showed signs of being annoyed.

Boys, ' shouted the gentleman, throwing up the drawing room window before he spoke; go farther off, boys. You have no business to make such an uproar before any person's dwelling.' Shan't go for you, ' drawled out a big boy from the crowd of smaller ones; 'you can't hinder us from playing here as long as we like.'

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