As the young woman delivered the letters, in turn, to the men who were patiently drawn up in Indian file, she made that simple act a medium of privileged but limited conversation on special or general topics,--gay or serious as the case might be, or the temperament of the man suggested.

That it was almost always of a complimentary character on their part may be readily imagined; but it was invariably characterized by an element of refined restraint, and, whether from some implied understanding or individual sense of honour, it never passed the bounds of conventionality or a certain delicacy of respect.

The delivery was consequently more or less protracted, but when each man had exchanged his three or four minutes' conversation with the fair postmistress,--a conversation at times impeded by bashfulness or timidity, on his part solely, or restricted often to vague smiling,--he resignedly made way for the next.

It was a formal levee, mitigated by the informality of rustic tact, great good-humor, and infinite patience, and would have been amusing had it not always been terribly in earnest and at times touching.

For it was peculiar to the place and the epoch, and indeed implied the whole history of Mrs.Baker.
She was the wife of John Baker, foreman of "The Last Chance," now for a year lying dead under half a mile of crushed and beaten-in tunnel at Burnt Ridge.