There was something so simple and strong and manly about him, as he had sat there by her side, contrasted with the baser and better dressed men before her, that she took his address as an honorable courtesy.
When the woodsman went out upon the steps of the town-hall, to get a breath, he found there such an assembly of boys as usually gathers in villages on the smallest public occasion.

Squarely before the door stood Mr.Belcher's grays, and in Mr.Belcher's wagon sat Mr.Belcher's man, Phipps.

Phipps was making the most of his position.

He was proud of his horses, proud of his clothes, proud of the whip he was carelessly snapping, proud of belonging to Mr.Belcher.The boys were laughing at his funny remarks, envying him his proud eminence, and discussing the merits of the horses and the various points of the attractive establishment.
As the stranger appeared, he looked down upon the boys with a broad smile, which attracted them at once, and quite diverted them from their flattering attentions to Phipps--a fact quickly perceived by the latter, and as quickly revenged in a way peculiar to himself and the man from whom he had learned it.
"This is the hippopotamus, gentlemen," said Phipps, "fresh from his native woods.

He sleeps underneath the banyan-tree, and lives on the nuts of the hick-o-ree, and pursues his prey with his tail extended upward and one eye open, and has been known when excited by hunger to eat small boys, spitting out their boots with great violence.