false
alarm.

Even then there was half the population of Plotzk on hand the next
morning. We were the heroes of the hour. I remember how the women
crowded around mother, charging her to deliver messages to their
relatives in America; how they made the air ring with their
unintelligible chorus; how they showered down upon us scores of
suggestions and admonitions; how they made us frantic with their
sympathetic weeping and wringing of hands; how, finally, the ringing of
the signal bell set them all talking faster and louder than ever, in
desperate efforts to give the last bits of advice, deliver the last
messages, and, to their credit let it be said, to give the final,
hearty, unfeigned good-bye kisses, hugs and good wishes.

Well, we lived through three years of waiting, and also through a half
hour of parting. Some of our relatives came near being carried off, as,
heedless of the last bell, they lingered on in the car. But at last
they, too, had to go, and we, the wanderers, could scarcely see the
rainbow wave of colored handkerchiefs, as, dissolved in tears, we were
carried out of Plotzk, away from home, but nearer our longed-for haven
of reunion; nearer, indeed, to everything that makes life beautiful and
gives one an aim and an end--freedom, progress, knowledge, light and
truth, with their glorious host of followers. But we did not know it
then.

The following pages contain the description of our journey, as I wrote
it four years ago, when it was all fresh in my memory.

M. A.

FROM PLOTZK TO BOSTON.

The short journey from Plotzk to Vilna was uneventful. Station after
station was passed without our taking any interest in anything, for that
never-to-be-forgotten leave taking at the Plotzk railway station left us
all in such a state of apathy to all things except our own thoughts as
could not easily be thrown off. Indeed, had we not been obliged to
change trains at Devinsk and, being the inexperienced travellers we
were, do a great deal of bustling and hurrying and questioning of
porters and mere idlers, I do not know how long we would have remained
in that same thoughtful, silent state.

Towards evening we reached Vilna, and such a welcome as we got! Up to
then I had never seen such a mob of porters and isvostchiky. I do not
clearly remember just what occurred, but a most vivid recollection of
being very uneasy for a time is still retained in my memory. You see my
uncle was to have met us at the st