mother was at her wheel, spinning flax. She was a tidy little body,
of the old school. Her notions of the world in general were somewhat
narrow and antiquated; while the steeple-crown cap she wore on her
head so jauntily, and her apron of snow-white muslin, that hung so
neatly over a black silk dress, and was secured about the neck with
a small, crimped collar, gave her an air of cheerfulness the sweet-
ness of her oval face did much to enhance. My father, whose face and
hands were browned with the suns of some sixty summers, had a touch
of the patriarch about him. He often declared the world outside of
Cape Cod so wicked as not to be worth living in. He was short of
figure, had flowing white hair, a deeply-wrinkled brow, and
corrugated lips, and blue eyes, over-arched with long, brown
eyelashes. My mother ran to me, and my father grasped me firmly by
the hand, for he was not a little concerned about my stay on the
beach. Indeed, I may as well confess, that he regarded me as a
wayward youth, over whom it was just as well to exercise a guardian
hand. In his younger days he had been what was called extremely good
looking, a quality he frequently told me I had inherited, and from
which he feared I might suffer grievous harm, unless I exercised
great caution when divers damsels he had a jealous eye upon
approached me. My mother was less jealous of my exploits among the
sex, which she rather encouraged.

Another cause of anxiety with my father was the fact that I had
written a "Life and Times" of Captain Seth Brewster; which work,
though the hero was a fisherman, reached a sale of forty thousand
copies, put money in my pocket, and made me the pet of all the
petticoats round about. It was not unnatural, then, that my father,
with his peculiar turn of mind, should set me down as being
partially insane. I had also manufactured several very