writing directions for Marble's government when he got ashore. This put in
end to the banquet, and glad was I to see the table removed, and the other
signs of a tranquil night reappear.

It was twelve before the sloop was as low as Hudson, and I saw by our rate
of sailing, that, indeed, there was little prospect of her reaching New
York in time for Marble's necessities. He was landed, therefore, and Mr.
Hardinge and myself accompanied him to the stage-house, where we
ascertained that the next morning after breakfast he would be enabled to
get into the stage, which would reach town in the evening of the
succeeding day. But this was altogether too slow for Marble's impatience.
He insisted on procuring a private conveyance, and we saw him drive out of
the long street that then composed most of the city of Hudson, at a
slapping pace, about one o'clock in the morning. This important duty
discharged, Mr. Hardinge and I returned to the sloop in which Neb had been
standing off and on, in waiting for us, and again made sail down the
river. When I turned in, the Wallingford was getting along at the rate of
about five miles the hour; the wind having freshened, and come out at the
westward, a quarter that just enabled her to lay her course.

The reader will easily imagine I did not oversleep myself the following
morning. My uneasiness was so great, indeed, that I dreamed of the
dreadful accident which had produced my father's death, and then fancied
that I saw him, my mother, and Grace, all interred at the same time, and
in the same grave. Fortunately, the wind stood at the west, and the sloop
was already within twenty miles of the creek at Clawbonny, when I got on
deck. All was quiet in the after-cabin; and, Mr. Hardinge still continuing
in his berth, I went out to breathe the fresh morning air, without
speaking to any below. There was no one on the quarter-deck but the pilot,
who was at the helm; though I saw a pair of legs beneath the boom, close