Free Peter Loon by Van Reid Page B

im moderately the very land we have labored into small success?”
    Some gave wordless agreement to this, but others were a little shocked that anyone would argue with the clergyman. For his part, Parson Leach showed no vexation; this was not a church, after all, and he had not delivered of a formal sermon.
    â€œIt is easy enough,” said another man by the door, perhaps emboldened by the first man’s words, “easy enough for you to preach moderation, sir, traveling from place to place on your horse, gaining your suppers by sermons and the clothes on your back by your books; but what of we who live in hovels while we clear the land and watch our children half starve for all the rocky ground can flourish and be half eaten by swarms of bugs and gnats in the fields and burned in the summer and chilled in the winter for lack of clothes? And we who bring down the wilderness with our bare hands are supposed to approach moderately the enemy who wields unjust power in the courts, and with his wealth, raised perhaps in the service of King George himself with whom so many of us have fought, and with this wealth buys what friends he needs and purposes he desires?”
    The man by the door was standing before he was finished, and those around him cheered when he sat down again. He may have been unused to speaking up among so many, however, for he appeared embarrassed and exhausted by the effort.
    All eyes turned back to Parson Leach, and he said, “I am not in great sympathy with the so-called Great Proprietors of Maine, but as long as the law, by whatever influence, takes their part, I would not see any of you become outlaws. I hear men beside me advising that Henry Knox’s mansion be burned, or that land agents and surveyors be hung at the crossroads; and I ask: What reply will Boston send but the State Militia in an attitude of war?”
    The parson now leaned, with his fingertips upon the table before him. “My friends, I believe that a man who carves the wilderness of his own main strength has greater claim than does a grant countenanced by a king who never set foot upon it or rightly understood the size and weight of the gift, or yet had the moral right to give it at all; but since England was expelled, revolutions in other parts of the land have been duly crushed, and it is only the distance between yourselves and the seats of power that keeps your cause balanced with that of your adversaries.”
    Another man spoke up, then. “Preacher Barrow says it is our duty to rid the nation of evil men.”
    â€œI know what Mr . Barrow says,” said Parson Leach. “And he will drive you up to desperate acts, but will he lead you?” Some low pools of discussion were raised by this question, but Parson Leach added, “This will be a hard fought war, won by time and generation as much as by design and plan. I warrant, some action is justified, but for the love of God, your neighbors, and yourselves, it is enough to take the land agent’s and the surveyor’s labor and not their lives. Rather stake your claim by good work, than destroy another man’s by fire and ruin. This is the moderation I argue, my friends.”
    It was not a speech to quell anyone’s spirit but to make a man think, and by the faces before Parson Leach, it was, in this office, successful. He was himself, it seemed, a man of moderation, which in this instance meant knowing when he had said enough on one subject. He picked up his pipe and before sitting down he turned to Peter and indicating him with a nod, said, “This young fellow, by the way, is looking for his uncle.”
    Peter’s head came up. It was a moment, however, before the crowd could take in this sudden digression. Some were amused by the parson’s new tack, some relieved, but some were for the moment nettled that their own thoughts on the matter had not been expressed.
    â€œWhat’s his name, young fellow?” asked one of