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322 away with, as they were getting so old-fashioned ; but it is delightful to hear grandfather tell about them. It must have been a great sight to see the shoemakers change their signs when they moved into their new guild-hall. On their silk banner, which was waving in the air, was painted a large boot and an eagle with two heads; the youngest of the journeymen car- ried the "cup of welcome" and the "casket" of their guild, and wore flowing red and white ribbons on their shirt-sleeves; the older ones carried drawn swords with a lemon stuck on the point. There was a full band of music, and the finest of the instruments was the "bird," as grandfather called the great pole with the half-moon at the top, and all kinds of jin- gling gewgaws — quite Turkish music. It was lifted aloft and swung to and fro, and it jingled and tinkled, and it hurt one's eyes to look at all the gold and silver and brass on which the sun was shining. In front of the procession ran a harlequin dressed in clothes made of patches of every possible color, with a black face, and bells on his head like a sledge-horse." He struck the people with his wand, which made a loud noise without hurting them, and the people crushed against each other in trying to get backward or forward ; little boys and girls tumbled over one another and fell right into the gutter ; old women pushed their way with their elbows, looked cross, and kept on scolding. Some laughed and others talked; there were people on all the door-steps and in the windows, and even on the roofs. The sun was shining brightly ; then it began to rain a little also, but that was good for the farmers, and when the people were thoroughly drenched the rain was a blessing to the country. Ah, how grandfather could tell stories ! As a little boy he had seen all these grand sights in their greatest splendor. The oldest journeyman of the guild made a speech from the scaffolding where the sign was to be hung up, and the speech was a versified one, just as if it had been poetry, which it was ; in fact, there had been three people busy composing it, and they had first drunk a whole bowl of punch in order to make the speech really got>d. And the people shouted and cheered the speech, but they shouted and cheered still more when the harlequin came on the scaffolding and made faces at them. The buffoon was great at playing the fool, and drank mead out of dram-glasses, which he threw among the people, who caught them in the air. Grandfather had one of these glasses, w hich the mason who mixed the mortar had caught and presented to him. It was all very amusing, and the sign on the new guild-hall was hung with flowers and foliage. "Such a sight one never forgets, no matter how old one gets," said grandfather ; nor did he forget it, although he had seen many other sights and splendors, which he told us about. But what amused us most was to hear him telling about the shifting of sign-boards in the big town where he went to live.