Our deliverer was a superannuated seaman; inspired partly, no doubt, by the good-heartedness formerly, at least, thought to be characteristic of that class of men, and, partly, by respect for the memory of my father, who had been dead for some years, in the early prime of life, leaving behind him the best of reputations as a shipmaster and a man. Perhaps Tom Trudge had, at some time, sailed under him. I well remember the triumphant air with which this ancient mariner introduced himself into the kitchen, where all the family was assembled, doffing his tarpaulin, flourishing his shovel, and cutting one or two capers, in token of his hilarity at the accomplishment of his somewhat arduous job. Of course, there were profuse thanks and congratulations on the occasion; but I recollect only, that, after the second glass of grog furnished by my mother,--a refreshment to which Tom was only too partial,--he executed another spring from the floor, snapped his fingers and cried, "Tired, ma'am!--not a bit of it! For all I've done to-day, by the blessed binnacle I should think nothing at all of jumping over a meetin-us,--yes, a meetin-us, ma'am!" to the amazement, at the idea of such a feat, of certainly all the younger fry who were present at the ceremony. The town in which we lived was one of the very oldest of the New England settlements. Its situation is uncommonly beautiful, upon a slope descending from a moderately elevated ridge towards the bank of a noble river, which of late years has furnished more motive power to various manufacturing establishments in the towns and villages, which have sprung up on its borders, than any other stream in the world. At the time of which I write, there was not a mill throughout its whole extent. It is told, that Louis Philippe, when a fugitive in this country, in his youth, passing up the road which leads mostly along the margin of the river to a point where the first falls interrupt the navigation, pronounced the scenery the most beautiful he had ever seen. The river was then chiefly famous for the rafts of admirable timber which it sent down from the primeval forests above, for the construction of the unsurpassed ships built near the town, and for the commerce flourishing upon its bosom and extending to every quarter of the globe. It was idle enough, in comparison, at a later period.