There were bones in the village graveyards of Fox County to father all these sharp features; Elgin market square, indeed, was the biography of Fox County and, in little, the history of the whole Province.

The heart of it was there, the enduring heart of the new country already old in acquiescence.

It was the deep root of the race in the land, twisted and unlovely, but holding the promise of all.

Something like that Lorne Murchison felt about it as he stood for a moment in the passage I have mentioned and looked across the road.

The spectacle never failed to cheer him; he was uniformly in gayer spirits, better satisfied with life and more consciously equal to what he had to do, on days when the square was full than on days when it was empty.