young woman, was overturned, and the occupants were thrown
out. As Bernard rode to the scene of the accident, another horseman
galloped up from the opposite direction. The two riders dismounted,
found that the driver was not hurt, and succeeded in restoring the
young woman to consciousness; an event which was marked, Bernard tells
us, by a volley of invectives addressed to her unfortunate husband.
"The horse," continues Bernard, "was now on his legs, but the vehicle
still prostrate, heavy in its frame, and laden with at least half a
ton of luggage. My fellow-helper set me an example of activity in
relieving it of the internal weight; and when all was clear, we
grasped the wheel between us, and to the peril of our spinal columns
righted the conveyance. The horse was then put in, and we lent a
hand to help up the luggage. All this helping, hauling, and lifting
occupied at least half an hour, under a meridian sun, in the middle of
July, which fairly boiled the perspiration out of our foreheads." The
possessor of the chaise beguiled the labor by a full personal history
of himself and his wife, and when the work was done invited the two
Samaritans to go with him to Alexandria, and take a drop of "something
sociable." This being declined, the couple mounted into the chaise and
drove on. "Then," says Bernard, "my companion, after an exclamation at
the heat, offered very courteously to dust my coat, a favor the return
of which enabled me to take deliberate survey of his person. He was
a tall, erect, well-made man, evidently advanced in years, but who
appeared to have retained all the vigor and elasticity resulting from
a life of temperance and exercise. His dress was a blue coat buttoned
to his chin, and buckskin breeches. Though the instant he took off his
hat I could not avoid the recognition of familiar lineaments, which
indeed I was in the habit of seeing on every sign-post and over every
fireplace, still I failed to identify him, and to my surprise I found
that I was an object of equal speculation in his eyes." The actor
evidently did not have the royal gift of remembering faces, but the
stranger possessed that quality, for after a moment's pause he said,
"Mr. Bernard, I believe," and mentioned the occasion on which he had
seen him play in Philadelphia. He then asked Bernard to go home with
him for a couple of hours' rest, and pointed out the house in the
distance. At last Bernard knew to whom he was speaking. "'Mount
Vern