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“What did they say in church when the captain came in, Aunt Polly?” said I.

“Well, a good many of them laughed–they couldn’t help it, to save them; but the cap’n he was some hard o’ hearin’, so he never noticed it, and he set there in the corner and fanned him, as pleased and satisfied as could be. The singers they had the worst time, but they had just come to the end of a verse, and they played on the instruments a good while in between, but I could see ’em shake, and I s’pose the tune did stray a little, though they went through it well. And after the first fun of it was over, most of the folks felt bad. You see, the cap’n had been very much looked up to, and it was his misfortune, and he set there quiet, listening to the preaching. I see some tears in some o’ the old folks’ eyes: they hated to see him so broke in his mind, you know. There was more than usual of ’em out that day; they knew how bad he’d feel if he realized it. A good Christian man he was, and dreadful precise, I’ve heard ’em say.”

“Did he ever go again?” said I.

“I seem to forget,” said Aunt Polly. “I dare say. I wasn’t there but from the last of June into November, and when I went over again it wasn’t for three years, and the cap’n had been dead some time. His mind failed him more and more along at the last. But I’ll tell you what he did do, and it was the week after that very Sunday, too. He heard it given out from the pulpit that the Female Missionary Society would meet with Mis’ William Sands the Thursday night o’ that week–the sewing society, you know; and he looked round to us real knowing; and Cousin Statiry, says she to me, under her bonnet, ‘You don’t s’pose he’ll want to go?’ and I like to have laughed right out. But sure enough he did, and what do you suppose but he made us fix over a handsome black watered silk for him to wear, that had been his sister’s best dress. He said he’d outgrown it dreadful quick. Cousin Statiry she wished to heaven she’d thought to put it away, for Jacob had given it to her, and she was meaning to make it over for herself; but it didn’t do to cross the cap’n and Jacob Gunn gave Statiry another one–the best he could get, but it wasn’t near so good a piece, she thought. He set everything by Statiry, and so did the cap’n, and well they might.

“We hoped he’d forget all about it the next day; but he didn’t; and I always thought well of those ladies, they treated him so handsome, and tried to make him enjoy himself. He did eat a great supper; they kep’ a-piling up his plate with everything. I couldn’t help wondering if some of ’em would have put themselves out much if it had been some poor flighty old woman. The cap’n he was as polite as could be, and when Jacob come to walk home with him he kissed ’em all round and asked ’em to meet at his house. But the greatest was–land! I don’t know when I’ve thought so much about those times–one afternoon he was setting at home in the keeping-room, and Statiry was there, and Deacon Abel Pinkham stopped in to see Jacob Gunn about building some fence, and he found he’d gone to mill, so he waited a while, talking friendly, as they expected Jacob might be home; and the cap’n was as pleased as could be, and he urged the deacon to stop to tea. And when he went away, says he to Statiry, in a dreadful knowing way, ‘Which of us do you consider the deacon come to see?’ You see, the deacon was a widower. Bless you! when I first come home I used to set everybody laughing, but I forget most of the things now. There was one day, though”–

“Here comes your father,” said Mrs. Snow. “Now we mustn’t let him go by or you’ll have to walk ‘way home.” And Aunt Polly hurried out to speak to him, while I took my great bunch of golden-rod, which already drooped a little, and followed her, with Mrs. Snow, who confided to me that the captain’s nephew Jacob had offered to Polly that summer she was over there, and she never could see why she didn’t have him: only love goes where it is sent, and Polly wasn’t one to marry for what she could get if she didn’t like the man. There was plenty that would have said yes, and thank you too, sir, to Jacob Gunn.

That was a pleasant afternoon. I reached home when it was growing dark and chilly, and the early autumn sunset had almost faded in the west. It was a much longer way home around by the road than by the way I had come across the fields.