bottles of a peculiarly penetrating
perfume, a large supply of which he had been talked into purchasing by a
Boston traveling salesman.

"Smell it, Ros, do ye?" whispered Sim, grinning triumphantly between
the points of a "stand-up" collar. "I give you my word when that
slick-talkin' drummer sold me all that perfumery, I thought I was stuck
sure and sartin. But then I had an idee. Every time women folks come
into the store and commenced to talk about the weddin' I says to 'em,
says I, 'Can't sell you a couple of handkerchiefs to cry on, can I, Miss
So-and-so? Weddin's are great places for sheddin' tears, you know.' If
I sold 'em the handkerchiefs all well and good; but if they laughed
and said they had a plenty, I got out my sample bottle of 'May Lilock',
that's the name of the cologne, and asked 'em to smell of it. 'If you
cry with that on your handkerchief,' says I, 'all hands will be glad to
have you do it. And only twenty cents a bottle!' You wouldn't believe
how much I sold. You can smell this weddin' afore you come in sight of
the house, can't ye now."

You could, and you continued to smell it long after you left. My best
suit reeked of "May Lilac" weeks later when I took it out of the closet.

Dorinda was there, garbed in rustling black alpaca, her Sunday gown for
ten years at least, and made over and "turned" four or five times. Lute
was on deck, cutaway coat, "high water" trousers and purple tie, grand
to look upon, Alvin Baker and Elnathan Mullet and Alonzo Black and
Thoph Newcomb and Zeb Kendrick were, as the Item would say, "among those
present" and if Zeb's black cutaway smelled slightly of fish it was, at
least, a change from the pervading "May Lilac."

Captain Jed strutted pompously about, monarch of the day. He greeted me
genially.

"Hello, Ros!" he said. "You out here? Thought you'd be busy overhaulin'
George's runnin' riggin' and makin' sure he was all ready to heave
alongside the parson."

"I have been," I answered. "I am on my way back there now."

"All right, all right. Matildy give me fits for not stayin' upstairs
until the startin' gun was fired, but I told her that, between her with
her eyes full of tears and Olindy Cahoon with her mouth full of pins,
'twas no place for a male man. So I cleared out till everything was
shipshape. Say, Ros," he laid his hand on my shoulder and bent to
whisper in my ear: "Say, Ros," he said, "I'm glad to see you're takin'
my advice."

"Taking your advice?