“At last a chance came for me to leave the coast, and I availed myself of it. An English sailing vessel, bound for Liverpool, took me on board, but, as if I were a second Jonah, we encountered heavy seas and violent storms, so that we were double the usual length of time in reaching Liverpool, where I took a steamer for New York, where I landed just a week before you found me here. Not wishing to shock my family, as I knew they would be shocked if they had never received my letter, I telegraphed to Mr. Beresford that I should be home on the next train from New York. The news took him as much by surprise as if one of the dead bodies in the grave-yard had walked in upon him, and I have been told that all Merrivale was wild with excitement, and that Uncle Tom, usually so quiet and undemonstrative, went himself and rang the fire-bell, to call the people out so as to tell them the news. I really believe the entire town was at the station to meet me when the train came in, and had I permitted it some of the men would have carried me in their arms up the hill to my very door, where Ethel and Grace and grandma were waiting to receive me. Mother was in bed, going from one fainting fit to another, and father was with her trying to quiet her. Poor old father, I used to think he cared more for his ferns and his flowers than for his children, but I have changed my mind, and never shall forget the expression of his face when he met me at the door, and, leading me to my mother, said to her, so tenderly: “Here he is, Mary—here is our boy. Now please don’t faint again. ‘Praised be God.’