Friday and
Saturday, apparently disgusted at finding rebellion such a failure in
elements of recreation, these had gone back to their farm-work and
chores, and the village had returned to its normal quiet without even
any more serenades to the silk stockings, to enliven the evenings.
A foreigner, who had chanced to be passing through Southern Berkshire
at this time, would have deemed an informant practicing on his
credulity who should have assured him that everywhere throughout these
quiet and industrious communities, the entire governmental machinery
was prostrate, that not a local magistrate undertook to sit, not a
constable ventured to attempt an arrest, not a sheriff dared to serve
a process or make an execution, or a tax-collector distrain for taxes.
And yet such was the sober truth, for Stockbridge was in no respect
peculiarly situated, and in many of the towns around, especially in
Sheffield, Egremont, Great Barrington, and Sandisfield, an even larger
proportion of the people were open sympathizers with the rebellion
than in the former village.
In these modern days, restaurants, barrooms, and saloons, and similar
places of resort, are chiefly thronged on Saturday evening, when the
labors of the week being ended, the worker, in whatever field, finds
himself at once in need of convivial relaxation, and disposed thereto
by the exhilaration of a prospective holiday.
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