* * * * * But, after all, Dolly and Alfred Dunbar were not yet engaged. No decisive word had been spoken between them; though it seemed now as if but a word were wanting. It was after a week of happy visiting, when he had made himself most charming to all in the house, when Dolly and he had together explored every walk and glen and waterfall around Poganuc, that at last the young man found voice to ask the Doctor for what he wanted; and, armed with the parental approval, to put the decisive question to Dolly. Her answer is not set down. But it is on record that in the month of June there was a wedding at Poganuc which furnished the town with things to talk about for weeks. It was a radiant June morning, when the elms of Poganuc were all alive with birds, when the daisies were white in the meadows, and the bobolink on the apple-tree was outdoing himself, that Hiel drove up to the door of the Parsonage to take Dolly and her husband their first day's journey towards their new home. There were the usual smiles and tears and kissing and crying, and then Hiel shut the stage-door, mounted his box, and drove away in triumph. It was noticed that he had ornamented his horses with a sprig of lilac blossoms over each ear, and wore a great bouquet in his button-hole. And so our Dolly goes to her new life, and, save in memories of her childhood, is to be no longer one of the good people of Poganuc. * * * * * Years have passed since then. Dolly has held her place among the matronage of Boston; her sons have graduated at Harvard, and her daughters have recalled to memory the bright eyes and youthful bloom of their mother. As to Poganuc, all whom we knew there have passed away; all the Town-Hill aristocracy and the laboring farmers of the outskirts have gone, one by one, to the peaceful sleep of the Poganuc graveyard. There was laid the powdered head, stately form, and keen blue eye of Colonel Davenport; there came in time the once active brain and ready tongue of Judge Belcher; there, the bright eyes and genial smile of Judge Gridley; there, the stalwart form of Tim Hawkins, the gray, worn frame of Zeph Higgins. Even Hiel's cheery face and vigorous arm had its time of waxing old and passing away, and was borne in to lie quiet under the daisies. The pastor and his wife sleep there peacefully with their folded flock around them. "Kinsman and townsman are laid side by side, Yet none have saluted, and none have replied." A village of white stones stands the only witness of the persons of our story. Even the old meeting-house is dissolved and gone.