I told father that I had said I shouldn't take any interest of him, but it had run so long, I didn't know but what it would be right, for me to have the interest. I couldn't quite afford to give so much. The fifty dollars was just enough to pay the interest and I could endorse it on the back of the note. I turned a little in my chair, to look at father, as he sat off at one side and said but little to me, to see what I could make out in mind reading. I found that I failed; I could not make out, by what he said nor by his silence, what he thought of me. Then I told him, that I had a little job or two on hand, which I wanted him to help me about. I asked him it he would help me. He said he would if I didn't bother him too much. I told him I wanted him to have his stoop painted over, it would preserve and make the wood last longer, and make it look better. And I wanted him to go to Detroit for me, as soon as he could conveniently, and get some oysters, and other good things, and bring home with him. Then I wanted him to invite all of his children to come and take dinner with him and mother and enjoy the day together. Besides, I wanted him to take the fifty dollars, toward paying the expenses, and also take that note out of my way, toward what I was owing him. In a few days after that I was invited up to the castle to spend the day. We were all there, father, mother, brother, sister, and our companions. We had a good dinner. The table was spread with the bounties of life. We passed a very pleasant day, and listened to father's stories of wars, and stories connected with his early life. He would relate them as nobody else could. He told us stories that I had often heard him relate before. Still there was a charm in his manner of telling them and they seemed to be always good and new; his old stories were certainly as attractive, interesting and pleasing as ever before. It would make almost any one laugh who listened to them, though he always looked rather grave while repeating them. It pleased him to think that they all enjoyed them so much; but what pleased him still more was that his children were all alive at home. As they were most all singers, sometimes, he would set them singing for him, songs new and old, as he was no singer himself. Mother was a beautiful singer. He often got her to sing for him, and sometimes asked her to sing his favorite song, which was styled "The Star in The East." I have heard her sing it for him, at different times, ever since as long ago as I can remember hearing her sing. It was a beautiful piece, connected with the Messiah's advent, which happened over eighteen hundred years before. One verse of it was this: "Cold on his cradle the dew drops were shining, Low lies his head, with the beasts of the stall; Angels adore him in slumber reclining, Maker and Monarch and Savior of all."