Less than a quarter of a mile up the road from the Hicks home is the Friends' Meeting House, which Elias Hicks helped to build, if he did not design it. The timbers and rafters, which were large, and are still sound to the core, were hewed by hand of course. Like most of the neighboring buildings, its sides were shingled, and probably the original shingles have not been replaced since the house was built, a hundred and twenty-two years ago. The "public gallery" contained benches sloping steeply one above the other, making the view of the preacher's gallery easy from these elevated positions. Over the preacher's gallery, and facing the one just described, is room for a row of seats behind a railing. Whether this was a sort of a "watch-tower" from which the elders might observe the deportment of the young people in the seats opposite, or whether it was simply used for overflow purposes, tradition does not tell us. The fact probably is that what is known as the Hicks property at Jericho came to Elias by his wife Jemima. There is every reason to believe that at the time of his marriage he was a poor man, and as the young folks took up their residence at the Seaman home soon after their marriage, there was no time for an accumulation of property on the part of the head of the new family. The economic situation involved in the matter under consideration had a most important bearing on the religious service of Elias Hicks. Taking the Seaman farm brought him economic certainty, if not independence. It is hardly conceivable that he could have given the large attention to the "free gospel ministry" which he did, had there been a struggle with debt and difficulty which was so incidental in laying the foundations of even a moderate success a century and a quarter ago. It is by no means to be inferred, however, that Elias Hicks was ever a wealthy man, or possessed the means of luxury, for which of course he had no desire, and against which he bore a life-long testimony. The real point to be gratefully remembered is that he was not overburdened with the care and worry which a less desirable economic condition would have enforced. In the main, Elias Hicks saw his married children settle around him. Royal Aldrich, who married his oldest daughter, had a tannery, and lived on the opposite side of the road not far away. Valentine Hicks, who married another daughter, had a somewhat pretentious house for the time, at the foot of the little hill approaching the meeting house, and just beyond the house of Elias, Robert Seaman, who married the youngest daughter, lived only a few steps away. Joshua Willets, who married the third daughter, resided on the south side of the island, some miles distant. The time of scattering families, lured by business outlook and economic advantage, had not yet arrived. CHAPTER IX. The Hicks Family.