When we came by the store where the post-office was kept we saw a small knot of people gathered round the door, and stopped to see what had happened.  There was a forlorn horse standing near, with his harness tied up with fuzzy ends of rope, and the wagon was cobbled together with pieces of board; the whole craft looked as if it might be wrecked with the least jar.  In the wagon were four or five stupid-looking boys and girls, one of whom was crying softly.  Their father was sick, some one told us.  “He was took faint, but he is coming to all right; they have give him something to take:  their name is Craper, and they live way over beyond the Ridge, on Stone Hill.  They were goin’ over to Denby to the circus, and the man was calc’lating to get doctored, but I d’ know’s he can get so fur; he’s powerful slim-looking to me.”  Kate and I went to see if we could be of any use, and when we went into the store we saw the man leaning back in his chair, looking ghastly pale, and as if he were far gone in consumption.  Kate spoke to him, and he said he was better; he had felt bad all the way along, but he hadn’t given up.  He was pitiful, poor fellow, with his evident attempt at dressing up.  He had the bushiest, dustiest red hair and whiskers, which made the pallor of his face still more striking, and his illness had thinned and paled his rough, clumsy hands.  I thought what a hard piece of work it must have been for him to start for the circus that morning, and how kind-hearted he must be to have made such an effort for his children’s pleasure.  As we went out they stared at us gloomily.  The shadow of their disappointment touched and chilled our pleasure.

Somebody had turned the horse so that he was heading toward home, and by his actions he showed that he was the only one of the party who was glad.  We were so sorry for the children; perhaps it had promised to be the happiest day of their lives, and now they must go back to their uninteresting home without having seen the great show.

“I am so sorry you are disappointed,” said Kate, as we were wondering how the man who had followed us could ever climb into the wagon.

“Heh?” said he, blankly, as if he did not know what her words meant.  “What fool has been a turning o’ this horse?” he asked a man who was looking on.

“Why, which way be ye goin’?”

“To the circus,” said Mr. Craper, with decision, “where d’ye s’pose?  That’s where I started for, anyways.”  And he climbed in and glanced round to count the children, struck the horse with the willow switch, and they started off briskly, while everybody laughed.  Kate and I joined Mrs. Kew, who had enjoyed the scene.

“Well, there!” said she, “I wonder the folks in the old North burying-ground ain’t a-rising up to go to Denby to that caravan!”