own demerits, would make dark hints concerning the sudden prosperity
of the unportioned Quaker, yet his services, and possibly his wealth,
soon drove the recollection of these vague conjectures from men’s
minds. When the war ended, and the independence of the States was
acknowledged, Mr. Temple turned his attention from the pursuit of
commerce, which was then fluctuating and uncertain, to the settlement
of those tracts of land which he had purchased. Aided by a good deal
of money, and directed by the suggestions of a strong and practical
reason, his enterprise throve to a degree that the climate and rugged
face of the country which he selected would seem to forbid. His
property increased in a tenfold ratio, and he was already ranked among
the most wealthy and important of his countrymen. To inherit this
wealth he had but one child—the daughter whom we have introduced to
the reader, and whom he was now conveying from school to preside over
a household that had too long wanted a mistress.

When the district in which his estates lay had become sufficiently
populous to be set off as a county, Mr. Temple had, according to the
custom of the new settlements, been selected to fill its highest
judicial station. This might make a Templar smile; but in addition to
the apology of necessity, there is ever a dignity in talents and
experience that is commonly sufficient, in any station, for the
protection of its possessor; and Marmaduke, more fortunate in his
native clearness of mind than the judge of King Charles, not only
decided right, but was generally able to give a very good reason for
it. At all events, such was the universal practice of the country and
the times; and Judge Temple, so far from ranking among the lowest of
his judicial contemporaries in the courts of the new counties, felt
himself, and was unanimously acknowledged to be, among the first.