emnly, "when, against my
entreaties, three candles were lighted last night?"

Never before was papa so long in walking up from the station--I suppose
for the reason that he came laden with messages, notes, and telegrams.
His "young chief" was detained in the editorial rooms by affairs of
great moment; another gentleman had been summoned to the bedside of his
father, who was in a dying condition; two other gentlemen had plunged
rashly into the preliminary steps to matrimony, and were, I suppose,
engaged in serenading their _fiancees_, while the other two had
apparently been made way with, for from them we had no message of any
sort.

The crowning injury was the receipt of a book from a friend who is in
the habit of supplying me with the latest novels. Usually I am pleased
with the books she sends me, but a glance at the title, "'He Cometh
Not,' She Said," made me hurl it to the farthest corner of the room;
that was too much for any one to bear.

We sat down with small appetites to the elaborate dinner that Lina had
prepared, and went gloomily to bed at an early hour.

CHAPTER XXI.

The Story of Mr. Greeley's Parents continued--He accompanies his Mother
to New Hampshire--Her Sisters--Three Thanksgivings in One Year--Pickie
as a Baby--His Childhood--Mrs. Greeley's Careful Training--His
Playthings--His Death--A Letter from Margaret Fuller.

_August 31_.

"Mammi," said I, waking from a deep reverie as I sat beside our bright
wood-fire (for we have had two days of dashing rain, and fires have not
been at all disagreeable), "did grandpapa ever return to New Hampshire
after he left it in 1821?"

"No, my dear," was the reply; "he never returned, nor did he manifest
any desire to see his former home and his old friends again. I suppose
that all of his pleasant recollections of New Hampshire were superseded
by the thought that it was the scene of his bankruptcy, and his proud
spirit shrunk from meeting those who might remember that he had left
Amherst a fugitive. He was deeply attached to his forest home, and I
do not think he ever had an hour of discomfort after he came there.
Father always expressed the wish that he might be buried upon his farm.
His old age was very serene and happy; he lived to see his 'hole in the
forest' become an extensive farm, and the vast wilderness that had
surrounded him disappear, while the little tavern and cluster of
log-houses across the State line from us grew to be the villag