a graceful pinion; he tamed somersets; he jumped, whirling backward as he went, over a platoon of boys laid flat on the ice; — the last boy winced, and thought he was amputated; but Wade flew over, and the boy still holds together as well as most boys. Besides this, he could write his name, with a flourish at the end, like the rubrica of a Spanish hidalgo. He could podograph any letter, and multitudes of ingenious curlicues which might pass for the alphabets of the unknown tongues. He could not tumble.
It was Fine Art.
Bill Tarbox sometimes pressed the champion hard. But Bill stopped just short of Fine Art, in High Artisanship.
How Dunderbunk cheered this wondrous display! How delighted the whole population was to believe they possessed the best skater on the North River! How they struggled to imitate! How they tumbled, some on their backs, some on their faces, some with dignity like the dying Caesar, some rebelliously like a cat thrown out of a garret, some limp as an ancient acrobate! How they laughed at themselves and at each other!
“It’s all in the new skates,” says Wade, apologizing for his unapproachable power and finish.
“It’s suthin’ in the man,” says Smith Wheelwright.
“Now chase me, everybody,” said Wade.
And, for a quarter of an hour, he dodged the
