incontinently renting his farmstead to a son with whom he had been on
indifferent terms for years; dispatching his daughter, who had
heretofore acted as his housekeeper, off to a distant town to become an
apprentice to a milliner's trade; and stowing his clothes and a shot-bag
of hard money which he was known to possess into a sailor's chest, with
which, together with his gun and a Methodist preacher, he again hurried
off for the asylum of his beloved. Arrived once more in the witching
presence, he waited till evening (yet how he was constrained so to do is
more than I can tell), and then, as we made it a duty to be gathered
about him once more, the wedding took place.

The occasion was one of such interest, that the preacher could but make
the most of it. After the nuptial benediction had been pronounced, he
straightway launched forth into a homily of such graciousness and force,
that but few of us missed being forcibly wrought upon, while Mrs. Rose
was stirred apparently to the depths of her being. On the day succeeding
the marriage, our light-hearted Benedict abandoned himself to another
jollification. But the next morning, a schooner headed in towards the
beach, and, slackening the peaks of her sails, sent ashore a yawl, whose
crew saluted Mrs. Rose as an old and familiar friend, and with whose
apparition, without the least regard as to what shift we wreckers were
to make, a great packing was begun in the house. Bedsteads were taken
down, beds were bundled up in sheets, crockery was thrust away in
barrels, and all borne one after the other to the yawl, where the bride,
with her potent parasol full spread, and pretending to shudder at the
sight of the gently heaving breakers through which she was soon to pass,
mincingly threw herself in the thick of the luggage, and old Bill
mounted the stern, with his huge palm extended for a good-by shake.
'Good-by, old chap,' said I, as I took his hand the last of all,
'good-by! You're not half mean enough to stay away from us forever; so