answered I; "not amongst respectable people, nor do I think that any people would, that either thought themselves respectable, or wished to be thought so." "'Don't be too severe upon us, Miss ----, I have always observed that those who _make believe_ so much modesty, have in reality but little. I always act as I feel, and speak as I think. I wish you to do the same, but have none of your make-believes with me--you smile--you begin to think you have been a little too scrupulous--you have no objection to bundling _now_, have you?" "Indeed I have." "I am not to be trifled with; so, if you refuse, I have done with you forever." "Then be done as quick as you please, for I'll not bundle with you nor with any other man." "Then farewell, proud girl," said he. "Farewell, honest man," said I, and off he went sure enough. "'I have since made inquiries about _bundling_, and find that it is _really_ the custom here, and that they think no more harm of it, than we do our way of a young couple sitting up together. I have known an instance, since I have been here, of a girl's taking her sweetheart to a neighbor's house and asking for a bed or two to lodge in, or rather to _bundle_ in. They had company at her father's, so that their beds were occupied; she thought no harm of it. She and her family are respectable. "'Grandmother says bundling was a very common thing in our part of the country, in old times; that most of the first settlers lived in log houses, which seldom had more than one room with a fire place; in this room the old people slept, so if one of their girls had a sweetheart in the winter she must either sit with him in the room where her father and mother slept, or take him into her sleeping room. She would choose the latter for the sake of being alone with him; but sometimes when the cold was very severe, rather than freeze to death, they would crawl under the bed-clothes; and this, after a while, became a habit, a custom, or a fashion. The man that I am going to send this by, is just ready to start, so I cannot stop to write more now. In my next I'll give you a more particular account of the people here. Adieu.' "_Mr. Editor_, you may be sure that what is related in the foregoing letter is the truth. I know that there is considerable _other_ information in it, mixed up with _that_ about which you wished to be informed, but I could not very well separate it."