Solemn, indeed, it was to me, as the memento of my approaching journey, which was to take place whenever the ice broke, which is here a kind of epoch. The parting with all that I loved at the Flats was such an affliction, as it is even yet a renewal of sorrows to recollect. I loved the very barn and the swamp I have described so much that I could not see them for the last time without a pang. As for the island and the bank of the river, I know not how I should have parted with them, if I had thought the parting final. The good kind neighbours, and my faithful and most affectionate Marian, to whom of all others, this separation was most wounding, grieved me not a little. I was always sanguine in the extreme, and would hope against hope; but Marian, who was older, and had more common sense, knew too well how little likelihood there was of my ever returning. Often with streaming eyes and bursting sobs, she begged to know if the soul of a person dying in America could find its way over the vast ocean to join that of those who rose to the abodes of future bliss from Europe; her hope of a reunion being now entirely referred to that in a better world. There was no truth I found it so difficult to impress upon her mind as the possibility of spirits being instantaneously transported from one distant place to another; a doctrine which seemed to her very comfortable. Her agony at the final parting I do not like to think of. When I used to obtain permission to pass a little time in town, I was transported with the thoughts of the enjoyments that awaited me in the society of my patroness, and the young friends I most loved. ------- CHAP. LXII. Departure from Albany—Origin of the state of Vermont.