You know it's a difficult job to catch a slave after he gets to the North, if he's as black as the ace of spades; and all Yankeedom would be up in arms at any attempt to seize such white ladies.

High war ensued among the principalities and powers of theology in all that portion of Yankeedom.

Were they Trolls forging diabolic enginery, or Gypsies of Yankeedom?

The answer to this is, simply, that while "School-committee Men" and "Village Oracles" are, doubtless, pretty much alike throughout Yankeedom, the particular specimens here dealt with were individuals whom the author knew in his boyhood "down on the Cape."