"A man braggin' gits riled if ye try 'n' choke him off." --Old Cy Walker.
Riverton, less provincial than Greenvale, was a village of some two thousand inhabitants. A few brick blocks, with less pretentious wooden buildings, formed a nucleus of stores. A brownstone bank, four churches, two hotels, the Quaboag House and the Astor House were intermingled among these, and a railroad with two trains in each direction a day added life and interest to the place. Each of the hotels sent a conveyance to meet every train, with a loud-voiced emissary to announce the fact of free transportation. In each hostelry a bar flourished, and like rival clubs, each had its afternoon and evening gathering of loafers who swapped yarns and gossip, smoked and chewed incessantly, and contributed little else to support the establishments. Three times daily, at meal hours, each of the rival landlords banged a discordant gong in his front doorway, without apparent result.
At about eleven in the forenoon each weekday in summer, Uncle Joe Barnes on his lumbering two-horse stage, arrived from Greenvale, paused at the post-office, threw off a mail-pouch, thence around to the Quaboag House stable, and cared for his horses. At two he was ready for the return trip and mounting his lofty seat, he again drove to the front of the hotel, shouting "All aboard!" dismounted to assist lady passengers, but let masculine ones do their own climbing, and after halting to receive a mail-bag, again departed on his return trip.
A certain monotonous regularity was apparent in every move and every act and function of village life in Riverton. At precisely seven o'clock each morning the two landlords appeared simultaneously and banged their gongs. At twelve and six, this was repeated. At eight o'clock the three principal storekeepers usually entered their places of business; at nine, and while the academy bell was ringing near by, every village doctor might be seen starting out. At ten exactly, Dwight Bennett, the cashier of the bank, unlocked its front door, and the two hotel 'buses invariably started so nearly together that they met at the first turn going stationward. Even the four church clocks had the same habit, and it was often related that a stranger there, a travelling man, on his first, visit, made an amusing discovery.