ere approval of
the great theologian, Steep;" "Take courage, my dear, and hope for the
best!"

The membership, meanwhile, are dropping in by couples to say kindly
words to our mother, whom they pity, and it is rumored that they are
collecting a purse to help us on our way. At last our father returns,
striving to hide his solicitude in a smile, for no fate to which they
could consign himself would scathe that grisly servant of his Master;
but for his family, who do not altogether share the spirit of his
mission, he has a little fear. He kisses us all in order, from the
least to the biggest, commencing and ending with our mother, and
playfully prevaricates as to our "appointment," the name of which we
noisily demand, until his wife says timidly,

"Where do they send us, Thomas?"

He tries to smile and trifle, but the possibility of her discontent
gives him so great pain that we children perceive it.

"How would you like to go to Greensburg?"

"Not _Greensburg_!" she says, with a sudden paleness.

"Isn't it a good circuit?" he says smilingly; "they paid the last
preacher three hundred dollars, and his marriage fees were a hundred
more. They say he saved fifty dollars a year!"

"Oh, Thomas, I thought I had fortitude, but this--"

"Is only to test your faith," he cries. "A poor preacher's wife should
be willing to go anywhere--even to Greensburg; but that is not our
appointment, dear; we move to Swan Neck."

Then the fun begins in earnest. The church people come to look at our
contribution bedquilts, and help us pack up the blue earthenware. The
legs of the prodigious box, yclept a milk chest, are summarily
amputated and laid away in it, with the parental library, which, we
are sorry to say, is equally doubtful in point of both ornament and
use. The good gossips slyly peep into the covers of Matthew Henry, and
regard their retiring pastor as a more learned man than they had
suspected, while the black letter-press of Lorenzo Dow, and John
Bunyan, and Fox's "Book of Martyrs" touches them like so much
necromancy. The faithful old clock, whose disorders are crises in our
humdrum pastoral year, is stopped and disjointed, much to our marvel,
and all the spare straw in the barn is brought to protect the large
gilt-edged cups and saucers, which say upon their edges, "To our
pastor," and "To our pastor's wife." The thin rag carpets are folded
away; the potatoes in the bin are sold to Brother Bibb, the grocer,
and to a ver