"Frank!" screamed the old woman, "you'd better go right up stairs and
take off them clothes--for the boy's been sent arter 'em more'n fifty
times. Frank borried them clothes, ma'am," she added to Julia, by way
of explanation, "to look smart when he went down east."

The bridegroom retired on this hint, and soon reappeared in a pair of
faded nankeen pantaloons, reaching to about the calf of the leg, a
very shabby black coat, out at the elbows, a ragged black vest, and,
instead of his varnished leather boots, a pair of immense cowhide
brogans.

"Now," said he, sitting quietly down by the cooking stove, "I begin to
feel at home. Ah! this is delightful, isn't it, dearest?" and he
warbled,--

"Though never so humble, there's no place like home."

Julia's heart swelled so that she could not utter a word.

"Dearest," said Frank, "I think you told me you had no objection to
smoking?"

"None in the least," said the bride; "I rather like the flavor of a
cigar."

"O, a cigar!" replied Belmont; "that would never do for a poor man."

And O, horror! he produced an old clay pipe, and filling it from a
little newspaper parcel of tobacco, began to smoke with a keen relish.