When Signor Urbini had taken his leave of us, we, that is, Priscilla and myself, came to a mutual understanding of the respective parts we were to perform. We agreed that it was useless for either to attempt any thing without the other. Our covenant was sealed. Poor Priscilla, little did she foresee what the future had in store for her! But let me not anticipate. We embraced, and I returned to my lodgings, intending to leave the next day for my home in western New York. Hardly had I regained my lodgings at the hotel, when I was called upon by the stanch old puritan, Mr. Cotton. I have departed far enough from the stand-point of my puritan ancestors, and have few traces in my moral constitution of my puritan descent; but, I care not who knows it, I am proud of these stern old men, the Bradfords, the Brewsters, the Hookers, the Davenports, and the stout Miles Standish, who came forth into a new world to battle with the wilderness, the savage, and the devil. Stern they were, stout-hearted, and strong of arm, yet not without a touch of human feeling. They had their loves, their affections, and their soft moments, when Jonathan or Ezekiel wooed his Beulah or his Keziah, who blushingly responded to his addresses, and the husband kissed his wife, the mother her boy, if it was not on the Sabbath. Honor to their memory! They did man’s work, and earned man’s wages, and as well might one of the modern Trasteverini blush for his old Roman progenitors, as I for my old puritan ancestors, who brought with them the bravest hearts and the best laws and the noblest institutions of old England, which they loved so tenderly, though she sent them forth as the Patriarch’s wife did Hagar and the dear Ismael into the desert. I liked Mr. Cotton, too, for his great ancestor’s sake, for great, O Cotton Mather, thou wast in thy day; hard service didst thou against fiends and witches, and powers invisible; and a noble epic hast thou left us in thy Magnalia. The college thou lovedst so well, and which thou didst cherish in thy heart of hearts, “_pro Christo et Ecclesia_,” may have ceased to cherish thy memory, and the Second Church, over which thou wast pastor as colleague with thy father, has learned to blush at thy memory, and to imagine it shows its wisdom in calling thee a “learned fool.” I, who have as little sympathy with them as with thee, honor thee as one of the worthies of my country, and as one who was not the least among the worthies of my native land in thy day and generation. Men look upon thee as antiquated, and fancy that they have become wiser than thou wast. Would to Heaven they had a little of thy good sense, and of the truth, which thou wast not ashamed to profess and defend!