By the time I neared Bath the hands of my watch pointed to supper.  I was still a bit shy of Mifflin’s scheme of stopping overnight at farmhouses, so I thought I’d go right into the town and look for a hotel.  The next day was Sunday, so it seemed reasonable to give the horse a good rest and stay in Bath two nights.  The Hominy House looked clean and old-fashioned, and the name amused me, so in I went.  It was a kind of high-class boarding-house, with mostly old women around.  It looked to me almost literary and Elbert Hubbardish compared to the Grand Central in Shelby.  The folks there stared at me somewhat suspiciously and I half thought they were going to say they didn’t take pedlars; but when I flashed a new five-dollar bill at the desk I got good service.  A five-dollar bill is a patent of nobility in New England.

My! how I enjoyed that creamed chicken on toast, and buckwheat cakes with syrup!  After you get used to cooking all your own grub, a meal off some one else’s stove is the finest kind of treat.  After supper I was all prepared to sit out on the porch with my sweater on and give a rocking chair a hot box, but then I remembered that it was up to me to carry on the traditions of Parnassus.  I was there to spread the gospel of good books.  I got to thinking how the Professor never shirked carrying on his campaign, and I determined that I would be worthy of the cause.

When I think back about the experience, it seems pretty crazy, but at the time I was filled with a kind of evangelistic zeal.  I thought if I was going to try to sell books I might as well have some fun out of it.  Most of the old ladies were squatting about in the parlour, knitting or reading or playing cards.  In the smoking-room I could see two dried-up men.  Mrs. Hominy, the manager of the place, was sitting at her desk behind a brass railing, going over accounts with a quill pen.  I thought that the house probably hadn’t had a shock since Walt Whitman wrote “Leaves of Grass.”  In a kind of do-or-die spirit I determined to give them a rouse.

In the dining-room I had noticed a huge dinner bell that stood behind the door.  I stepped in there, and got it.  Standing in the big hall I began ringing it as hard as I could shake my arm.

You might have thought it was a fire alarm.  Mrs. Hominy dropped her pen in horror.  The colonial dames in the parlour came to life and ran into the hall like cockroaches.  In a minute I had gathered quite a respectable audience.  It was up to me to do the spellbinding.

“Friends,” I said (unconsciously imitating the Professor’s tricks of the trade, I guess), “this bell which generally summons you to the groaning board now calls you to a literary repast.  With the permission of the management, and with apologies for disturbing your tranquillity, I will deliver a few remarks on the value of good books.  I see that several of you are fond of reading, so perhaps the topic will be congenial?”