been a soldier, and many persons in Urbana still saluted him as major, though at that time he was mayor; going up town, in fact, meant to go to the town hall before going anywhere else. In the shade he removed his hat, and taking out a large silk handkerchief, passed it several times over his red, perspiring face.
It was, as I have said, a hot afternoon, even for an August afternoon in Ohio, and it was the hottest hour of the afternoon. Main Street, when we turned into it presently, was deserted, and wore an unreal appearance, like the street of the dead town that was painted on the scene at the "opera-*house." Far to the south it stretched its interminable length in white dust, until its trees came together in that mysterious distance where the fair-*grounds were, and to the north its vista was closed by the bronze figure of the cavalryman standing on his pedestal in the Square, his head bowed in sad meditation, one gauntleted hand resting on his hip, the other on his saber-hilt. Out over the thick dust of the street the heat quivered and vibrated, and if you squinted in the sun at the cavalryman, he seemed to move, to tremble, in the shimmer of that choking atmosphere.
The town hall stood in Market Square; for, in addition to the Square, where the bronze cavalryman stood on his pedestal, there was Market Square, the day of civic centers not having dawned on Urbana in that time, nor, doubtless, in this.
Market Square was not a square, however, but a parallelogram, and on one side of it, fronting
