The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index
General
The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index
Literature -- Collections
He was as good as his word. At the time appointed, he drove out in his
gig to the lady's country residence, accompanied by Dr. Bogart, the
very clergyman who, just fifty years before, had married him to the
mother of his Theodosia. The lady was embarrassed, and still refused.
But then the scandal! And, after all, why not? Her estate needed a
vigilant guardian, and the old house was lonely. After much
hesitation, she at length consented to be drest, and to receive her
visitors. And she was married. The ceremony was witnessed only by the
members of Madame Jumel's family, and by the eight servants of the
household, who peered eagerly in at the doors and windows. The
ceremony over, Mrs. Burr ordered supper. Some bins of M. Jumel's
wine-cellar, that had not been opened for half a century, were laid
under contribution. The little party was a very merry one. The parson,
in particular, it is remembered, was in the highest spirits,
overflowing with humor and anecdote. Except for Colonel Burr's great
age (which was not apparent), the match seemed not an unwise one. The
lurking fear he had had of being a poor and homeless old man was put
to rest. She had a companion who had been ever agreeable, and her
estate a steward than whom no one living was supposed to be more
competent.
As a remarkable circumstance connected with this marriage, it may be
just mentioned that there was a woman in New York who had aspired to
the hand of Colonel Burr, and who, when she heard of his union with
another, wrung her hands and shed tears! A feeling of that nature can
seldom, since the creation of man, have been excited by the marriage
of a man on the verge of fourscore.
A few days after the wedding the "happy pair" paid a visit to
Connecticut, of which State a nephew of Colonel Burr was then
governor. They were received with attention. At Hartford Burr advised
his wife to sell out her shares in the bridge over the Connecticut at
that place, and invest the proceeds in real estate. She ordered them
sold. The stock was in demand, and the shares brought several thousand
dollars. The purchasers offered to pay her the money, but she said,
"No; pay it to my husband." To him, accordingly, it was paid, and he
had it sewed up in his pocket, a prodigious bulk, and brought it to
New York, and deposited it in his own bank, to his own credit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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