University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER TENTH.
THE CONCLUSION.

When Elbridge and Miriam re-entered the homestead
they found the best parlor, which they had left
in humble dependence on the light of a single home-made
wick, now in full glow, and wide awake in
every corner, with a perfect illumination of lamps and
candles; and every thing in the room had waked up
with them. The old brass andirons stood shining like
a couple of bare-headed little grandfathers by the
hearth; the letters in the sampler over the mantel,
narrating the ages of the family, had renewed their
color; the tall old clock, allowed to speak again,
stood like an overgrown schoolboy with his face
newly washed, stretching himself up in a corner;
the painted robins and partridges on the wall,
now in full feather, strutting and flying about in all
the glory of an unfading plumage; and at the rear
of all the huge back-log on the hearth glowed and

rolled in his place as happy as an alderman at a city
feast. The Peabodys too, partook of the new illumination,
and were there in their best looks, scattered
about the room in cheerful groups, while in the midst
of all the widow Margaret, her face lighted with a
smile which came there from far-off years, holding in
her hand as we see an angel in the sunny clouds in
old pictures, the ancient harpsichord, which till now
had been laid away and out of use for many a long
day of sadness.

While Elbridge and Miriam stood still in wonder
at the sudden change of this living pageant, old
Sylvester, his white head carried proudly aloft, appeared
from the sitting-room with Mr. Barbary, a
quaint figure, freed now of his long coat, and bearing
no trace of travel on his neat apparel and face of
cheerful gravity. Leaving the preacher in the centre
of the apartment, the patriarch advanced quietly toward
the young couple, and, addressing himself to
Elbridge, said, “My children, I have a favor to ask
of you.”

“Anything, grandfather!” Elbridge answered
promptly.

“You are sure?” Old Sylvester's eyes twinkled as
he spoke.

“It would be the pleasure and glory of my young
days,” Elbridge answered again, “to crown your noble
old age, grandfather, with any worthy wreath
these hands could fashion, and not call it a favor
either.”

Old Sylvester, smiling from one to the other, said,
“You are to be married immediately.”

The young couple fell back and dropped each the
other's hand, which they had been holding. Miriam
trembled and shrunk the farthest away.

“You will not deny me?” the grandfather said
again. “You are the youngest and the last whom I
can hope to see joined in that bond which is to continue
our name and race; it is my last request on
earth.”

At these simple words, turning, and with a fond
regard which spoke all their thoughts, Miriam and
Elbridge took again each the other's hand, and drew
close side to side. The company rose, and Mr. Barbary
was on the point of speaking when there
emerged upon the family scene, from an inner chamber,
as though he had been a foreigner entering a fashionable

drawing-room, Mr. Tiffany Carrack, in the
very blossom of full dress; his hair in glossy curl,
with white neckcloth and waistcoat of the latest cut
and tie, coat and pants of the purest model, pumps and
silk stockings; bearing in his hand a gossamer pocket-handkerchief,
which he shook daintily as he advanced,
and filled the room with a strange fragrance.
With mincing step, just dotting the ground, his whole
body shaking like a delicate structure in danger
every moment of tumbling to the ground, he advanced
to where Miriam and Elbridge stood before
Mr. Barbary.

“Why really, 'pon my life and honor, Miriam, you
are looking quite charming this evening!”

“She should look so now if ever, Tiffany,” said
old Sylvester, “for she is just about to be married to
your cousin Elbridge.”

“Now you don't mean that?” said Mr. Tiffany,
touching the tawny tufts tenderly with his perfumed
pocket-handkerchief, “Oh, woman! woman! what
is your name?” He hesitated for a reply.

“Perfidy?” suggested Mr. Oliver Peabody.

“Yes, that's it. Have I lived to look on this,”
Mr. Tiffany continued; “to have my young hopes

blighted, the rose of my existence cropped, and all
that. Is it for this,” addressing Miriam directly: he
had been talking before to the air: “Is it for this I
went blackberrying with you in my tender infancy!
Is it for this that in the heyday of youth I walked
with you to the school-house down the road! Was
it for this that in the prime of manhood I breathed
soft music in your ear at the witching time of night!”

As he arrived at this last question, Mopsey, in her
new gown of gorgeous pattern, and, having laid
aside her customary broad-bordered cap, with a high
crowned turban of red, and yellow cotton handkerchief
on her head, appeared at the parlor door. Mr.
Tiffany paused: he saw the Moorish princess before
him; rallying, however, he was proceeding to describe
himself as a friendly troubadour, whose affection
had been responded to, when the Captain placing
his mouth to his ear, as in confidence, uttered in
a portentous whisper, “THE VAT!”

Mr. Tiffany immediately lost all joint and strength,
subsided into a chair at a distance, and from that
moment looked upon the scene like one in a trance.

“After all,” said Mr. Oliver, glancing at him, “I
don't see just now that, in any point of view, this

young gentleman is destined to carry the principles
of free government—anywhere.”

The family being now all gathered, Mr. Barbary
proceeded, employing a simple and impressive form
in use in that family from its earliest history:

“You, the Bridegroom and the Bride, who now
present yourselves candidates of the covenant of God
and of your marriage before him, in token of your
consenting affections and united hearts, please to give
your hands to one another.

“Mr. Bridegroom, the person whom you now take
by the hand, you receive to be your married wife:
you promise to love her, to honor her, to support her,
and in all things to treat her as you are now, or shall
hereafter be convinced is by the laws of Christ made
your duty,—a tender husband, with unspotted fidelity
till death shall separate you.

“Mrs. Bride, the person whom you now hold by
the hand you accept to be your married husband;
you promise to love him, to honor him, to submit to
him, and in all things to treat him as you are now
or shall hereafter be convinced, is by the laws of
Christ made your duty,—an affectionate wife, with
inviolable loyalty till death shall separate you.

“This solemn covenant you make, and in this sacred
oath bind your souls in the presence of the Great
God, and before these witnesses.

“I then declare you to be husband and wife regularly
married according to the laws of God and the
Commonwealth: therefore what God hath thus joined
together let no man put asunder.”

When these words had been solemnly spoken the
widow Margaret struck her ancient harpsichord in an
old familiar tune of plaintive tenderness, and the
young bridegroom holding Miriam's hand in an affectionate
clasp, answered the music with a little hymn
or carol, often used before among the Peabodys on a
like occasion:

To which Miriam, after a brief pause of hesitation,
in that tone of chanting lament familiar to her, answered—

Like a cheerful voice answering to these, and wishing,
out of the mysterious darkness of night, all happiness
and prosperity to the young couple, the silver
call of Chanticleer arose without, renewed and renewed
again, as if he could never tire of announcing the
happy union to all the country round.

And now enjoyment was at its height among the
Peabodys, helped by Plenty, who, with Mopsey for
chief assistant, hurried in, with plates of shining pippins,
baskets of nuts, brown jugs of new cider of
home-made vintage; Mrs. Carrack, who had selected
the simplest garment in her wardrobe, moving about
in aid of black Mopsey, tendering refreshment to her
old father first, and Mrs. Jane Peabody insisting on
being allowed to distribute the walnuts with her own
hand.

The children, never at rest for a moment, frisked to
and fro, like so many merry dolphins, disporting in
the unaccustomed candle-light, to which they were
commonly strangers. They were listened to in all
their childish prattle kindly, by every one, indulged
in all their little foolish ways, as if the grown-up Peabodys
for this night at least, believed that they were
indeed little citizens of the kingdom of heaven, straying

about this wicked world on parole. Uncle Oliver,
once, spreading his great Declaration-of-Independence
pocket-handkerchief on his knees, attempted to put
them to the question as to their learning. They all recognised
Dr. Franklin, with his spectacles thrown up on
his brow, among the signers, but denying all knowledge
of anything more, ran away to the Captain,
who was busy building, a dozen at a time, paper
packet ships, and launching them upon the table for
a sea.

In the very midst of the mirthful hubbub old Sylvester
called Robert and William to his side, and was
heard to whisper, “Bring 'em in.” William and Robert
were gone a moment and returned, bearing under
heavy head-way, tumbling and pitching on one
side constantly, two ancient spinning wheels, Mopsey
following with snowy flocks of wool and spinning
sticks. Old Sylvester arose, and delivering a
stick and flock to Mrs. Carrack and Mrs. Jane Peabody,
requested them, in a mild voice and as a matter
of course already settled, “to begin.” A spinning-match!

“Yes, anything you choose to-night, father.”

Rolling back their sleeves, adjusting their gowns,

the wheels being planted on either side of the fire-place,
Mrs. Jane and Mrs. Carrack, stick in hand,
seized each on her allotment of wool, and sent the
wheels whirling. It was a cheerful sight to see the
two matrons closing in upon the wheel, retiring,
closing in again—whose wheel is swiftest, whose
thread truest? Now Mrs. Jane—now Mrs. Carrack.
If either, Mrs. Carrack puts the most heart in her
work.

“Now she looks like my Nancy,” said old Sylvester
in a glow, “as when she used to spin and sing,
in the old upper chamber.”

Away they go—whose thread is swiftest, whose
thread the truest now?

While swift and free the contest wages, the parlor-door
standing open, and beyond that the door of
the sitting-room, look down the long perspective!
Do you not see in the twilight of the kitchen fire a
dark head, lighting up, as in flashes, with a glittering
row of teeth, with a violent agitation of the body,
with gusty ha-ha's, and fragments of an uproarious
chant flying through the door something to this
effect—

Silence follows, in which nothing is observable
from that quarter more than a great pair of white
eyes rolling about in the partial darkness. Who
was other than pleased that in spite of Mopsey's
decision, old Sylvester determined that if either, Mrs.
Carrack's work was done a little the soonest, and
that her thread was a little the truest?

During the contest the old merchant and his wife
had conversed closely, apart; the green shade had
lost its terrors, and he could look on it steadily, now;
and at the close William Peabody approaching the fire-place,
drew from his bosom the old parchment deed,
which in his hunger for money had so often disquieted
his visits to the homestead, and thrust it into the
very heart of the flame, which soon shrivelled it up,
and, conveying it out at the chimney, before the night
was past spread it in peaceful ashes over the very
grounds which it had so long disturbed.

“So much for that!” said the old merchant, as the
last flake vanished; “and now, nephew,” he addressed
himself to Elbridge, “fulfilling an engagement
connected with your return, I resign to you all charge
of your father's property.”

“Did you bring anything with you from the Gold
Region?” Mrs. Carrack interposed.

“Not one cent, Aunt,” Elbridge answered promptly.

“You may add, William,” pursued Mrs. Carrack,
“the sums of mine you have in hand.”

William Peabody was pausing on this proposition,
the sums in question being at that very moment
embarked in a most profitable speculation.

Upon the very height of the festivity, when it
glowed the brightest and was most musical with mirthful
voices, there had come to the casement a moaning
sound as if borne upon the wind from a distance,
a wailing of anguish, at the same time like and unlike
that of human suffering. By slow advances it
approached nearer and nearer to the homestead, and
whenever it arose it brought the family enjoyment to
a momentary pause. It had drawn so near that it
sounded now again, as if in mournful lamentation, at

the very door, when Mopsey, her dark face almost
white, and her brow wrinkled with anxiety, rushed
in. “Grandfather,” she said, addressing old Sylvester,
“blind Sorrel's dying in the door-yard.”

There was not one in all that company whom the
announcement did not cause to start; led by old Sylvester,
they hastily rose, and conducted by Mopsey,
followed to the scene. Blind Sorrel was lying by the
moss-grown horse-trough, at the gate.

“I noticed her through the day,” said Oliver,
“wandering up the lane as if she was seeking the
house.”

“The death-agony must have been upon her then,”
said William Peabody, shading his eyes with his
hand.

“She remembered, perhaps, her young days,” old
Sylvester added, “when she used to crop the door-yard
grass.”

Mopsey, in her solicitude to have the death-bed of
poor blind Sorrel properly attended, had brought
with her, in the event of the paling or obscuration
of the moon, a dark lantern, which she held tenderly
aside as though the poor old creature still possessed
her sight; immoveable herself as though she had

been a swarthy image in stone, while, on the other
side, William Peabody, near her head, stood gazing
upon the animal with a fixed intensity, breathing
hard and watching her dying struggle with a rigid
steadiness of feature almost painful to behold.

“Has carried me to mill many a day,” he said;
“some pleasantest hours of my life spent upon her
back, sauntering along at early day.”

“Your mother rode her to meeting,” Sylvester
addressed his second son, “on your wedding-day,
Oliver. Sorrel was of a long-lived race.”

“She was the gentlest horse-creature you ever
owned, father,” added Mrs. Carrack, turning affectionately
toward old Sylvester, “and humored us
girls when we rode her as though she had been a
blood-relation.”

“I'm not so sure of that,” Mr. Tiffany Carrack rejoined,
“for she has dumped me in a ditch more
than once.”

“That was your own careless riding, Tiffany,” said
the Captain, “I don't believe she had the least ill-will
towards any living creature, man or beast.”

It was observed that whenever William Peabody
spoke, blind Sorrel turned her feeble head in that direction,

as if she recognised and singled out his voice
from all the others.

“She knows your voice, father, even in her darkness,”
said the Captain, “as the sailor tells his old
captain's step on deck at night.”

“Well she may, Charles,” the merchant replied,
“for she was foaled the same day I was born.”

The old creature moaned and heaved her side
fainter and fainter.

“Speak to her, William,” said the old grandfather.

William Peabody bent down, and in a tremulous
voice said, “Sorrel, do you know me?”

The poor blind creature lifted up her aged head
feebly towards him, heaved her weary side, gasped
once and was gone. The moon, which had been
shining with a clear and level light upon the group
of faces, dipped at that moment behind the orchard-trees,
and at the same instant the light in the
lantern flickering feebly, was extinguished.

“What do you mean by putting the light out,
Mopsey,” old Sylvester asked.

“I knew de old lamp would be goin' out, Massa,
soon as ever blind Sorrel die; I tremble so I do' no

what I'm saying.” It was poor Mopsey's agitation
which had shaken out the light.

“Never shall we know a more faithful servant,
a truer friend, than poor blind Sorrel,” they all agreed;
and bound still closer together by so simple a bond
as common sympathy in the death of the poor old
blind family horse, they returned within the homestead.

They were scarcely seated again when William Peabody,
turning to Mrs. Carrack, said, “Certainly!”
referring to the transfer of the money of hers in his
hands on loan, to Elbridge, “he will need some
ready money to begin the world with.”

All was cheerful friendship now; the family, reconciled
in all its members, sitting about their aged
father's hearth on this glorious Thanksgiving night;
the gayer mood subsiding, a sudden stillness fell upon
the whole house, such as precedes some new turn in
the discourse.

Old Sylvester Peabody sat in the centre of the
family, moving his body to and fro gently, and lifting
his white head up and down upon his breast; his
whole look and manner strongly arresting the attention
of all; of the children not the least. After a

while the old man paused, and looking mildly about,
addressed the household.

“This is a happy day, my children,” he said, “but
the seeds of it were sown, you must allow an old man
to say, long, long ago. If one good Being had not
died in a far country and a very distant time, we
could not have this comfort now.”

The children watched the old grandfather more
closely.

“I am an old man, and shall be with you, I feel,
but for a little while yet; as one who stands at the
gate of the world to come, looking through, and
through which he is soon to pass, will you not allow
me to believe that I thought of the hopes of your
immortal spirits in your youth?”

As being the eldest, and answering for the rest,
William Peabody replied, “We will.”

“Did I not teach you then, or strive my best to
teach, that there was but one Holy God?”

“You did, father—you did!” the widow Margaret
answered.

“That his only Son died for us?”

“Often—often!” said Mrs. Carrack.

“That we must love one another as brethren?”

“At morning and night, in winter and summer;
by the hearth and in the field, you did,” Oliver rejoined.

“That there is but one path to happiness and
peace here and hereafter,” he continued, “through
the performance of our duty towards our Maker, and
our fellow men of every name, and tongue, and
clime, and color? to love your dear Native Land, as
she sits happy among the nations, but to remember
this, our natural home, is but the ground-nest and
cradle from which we spread our wings to fly through
all the earth with hope and kindly wishes for all men.
If the air is cheerful here, and the sun-light pleasant,
let no barrier or wall shut it in, but pray God, with
reverent hope, it spread hence to the farthest lands
and seas, till all the people of the earth are lighted up
and made glad in the common fellowship of our
blessed Saviour, who is, was, and will be evermore—
to all men guide, protector, and ensample. May He
be so to us and ours, to our beloved home and happy
Fatherland, in all the time to come!”

The old man bowed his head in presence of his reconciled
household, and fell into a sweet slumber;
not one of all that company but echoed the old man's

prayer—“May he be so to us and ours, to our beloved
Home and happy Fatherland in all the time
to come!”

On this, on every day of Thanksgiving and Praise,
be that old man's blessed prayer in all quarters,
among all classes and kindred, everywhere repeated:
“May He be so to us and ours, to our beloved Home
and happy Fatherland in all the time to come!”

And when, like that good old man, we come to
bow our heads at the close of a long, long life, may
we, like him, fall into a gentle sleep, conscious that
we have done the work of charity, and spread about
our path, wherever it lead, peace and good-will
among men!