66 FIVE ACRES TOO MUCH. 



devil-may-care lover of twenty-five. The parent dis 

 missed the latter, the daughter dismissed the former ; 

 the mother threatened to anathematize if she was not 

 obeyed, and, being disobeyed, did something of the 

 kind what, among gentlemen, would be called &quot;tall 

 swearing.&quot; The daughter, who had learned the hab 

 its of American children, consented to an elopement 

 with her lover; the time was set, the hour arrived. 



It was a bright moonlight night, the seventh of 

 October, in the year eighteen hundred and no matter 

 what ; a high wind was blowing, and scattered clouds 

 were driving rapidly across the sky ; the young gen 

 tleman at the appointed hour stood at the gate with 

 a pair of fast trotters and one of the lightest turn 

 outs of Brewster & Co., of Bond Street, having en 

 gaged a clergyman in the city of New York. Time 

 flew by, but he waited in vain. His lady-love had 

 not failed of her promises, however, but, after her 

 mother had retired, and by her loud snoring attested 

 the profundity of her repose, she quietly descended 

 the stairs, opened the front door silently as the ex- 

 pertest of thieves, and stepped upon the piazza. At 

 that moment a heavy cloud passed across the moon, 

 and a fierce gust slammed to the door ; fearing that 

 her mother might have been aroused, she groped her 

 way hastily across the piazza, caught the balustrade 



