It had been settled in church council, that our young minister should be installed a few weeks after the time appointed for his marriage, and the young couple submitted to the imposed delay without a murmur. During these intervening weeks, and while Malina was occupied in embellishing the parsonage, Mrs. Gray was observed to be absent from home more frequently than usual. There was scarcely an influential church member near the old meeting-house, with whom she had not taken her knitting work, to spend a social afternoon; and several tea-parties were given in a quiet way at her own house, where she presided over the silver tea-urn, and old fashioned china, with more than ordinary condescension and dignity. But these were all impromptu meetings, and invariably took place when Mr. Mosier and Phebe were invited elsewhere. The parents of our young minister were aged and very respectable farmers, residing in the vicinity of New Haven; but they were far from wealthy, and the farm they cultivated was not their own property. A week before the Sabbath appointed for the installation, Mr. Mosier accompanied his intended bride and her mother on a visit to his parents, where the haughty matron first learned that the man whom her daughter was about to marry had been a _charity student_. A benevolent society had paid his tuition at Yale College, at least that portion which he had been unable to meet by his own exertions. There had been no concealment of this truth on his part, for he had informed Phebe of the matter, and believed Mrs. Gray already aware of it. But Phebe, in the generous simplicity of her heart, never conceived it possible that the manner of his education could be deemed a cause of reproach, and it had left no impression on her mind; to her upright understanding there was no degradation in the thought that her lover had been a _charity student_. Mrs. Gray gave no demonstration of the displeasure which filled her bosom on receiving this intelligence, but she quietly made an excuse for returning home with her daughter the next day, and, with every appearance of disinterested kindness, insisted that Mr. Mosier should not interrupt his visit to accompany them. “She could easily drive home,” she said, “the horse was gentle, and the roads perfectly good; her son-in-law must remain with his family; it would be cruel to force him away so abruptly.” Mrs. Gray said all this in her usual manner, shook hands with the old people, allowed the young divine to assist her into the chaise, and pretended to be very intently occupied in searching for something in her traveling basket, while he placed Phebe in her seat, and, with her slender hand clasped in his own, was whispering his farewell. “Remember, and be in readiness next Sabbath,” he said, in a low voice, “tell Malina that she must take good care of you. I shall come on Saturday evening.”