Chapter 29

"I calmed her fears, and she was calm,
And told her love with virgin pride;
And so I won my Genevieve,
My bright and beauteous bride."

Coleridge.

By arrangement, I stopped at the Willow Cove, to pick up Marble. I found
the honest fellow happy as the day was long; but telling fearfully long
and wonderful yarns of his adventures, to the whole country round. My old
mate was substantially a man of truth; but he did love to astonish
"know-nothings." He appears to have succeeded surprisingly well, for the
Dutchmen of that neighbourhood still recount anecdotes, of the
achievements and sufferings of Captain Marvel, as they usually call him,
though they have long ceased to think the country belongs to the United
Provinces.

Moses was glad to see me; and, after passing a night in the cottage of his
mother, we proceeded towards Clawbonny, in a conveyance that had been sent
to Willow Cove to meet me. It was a carriage of my own, one of my own
negroes acting as driver. I knew the old team, and will acknowledge that
tears forced themselves to, my eyes as I thus saw myself, as it might be,
reinstated in my own. The same feeling came powerfully over me, as we
drove to the summit of an elevation in the road, that commanded a view of
the vale and buildings of Clawbonny. What a moment was that in my
existence! I cannot say that I was born to wealth, even as wealth was
counted among us sixty years since, but I was born to a competency. Until
I lost my ship, I had never known the humiliating sensations of poverty;
and the feeling that passed over my heart, when I first heard that
Clawbonny was sold, has left an impression that will last for life. I
looked at the houses, as I passed them in the streets, and remembered that
I was houseless. I did not pass a shop in which clothes were exposed,
without remembering that, were my debts paid, I should literally be
without a coat to my back. Now, I had my own once more; and there stood
the home of my ancestors for generations, looking comfortable and
respectable, in the midst of a most inviting scene of rural quiet and
loveliness. The very fields seemed to welcome me beneath its roof! There
is no use in attempting to conceal what happened; and I will honestly
relate it.

The road made a considerable circuit to descend the hill, while a
foot-path led down the declivity, by a shorter cut, which was always taken
by pedestrians. Making an incoherent excuse to Moses, and telling him to
wait for me at the foot of the hill, I sprang out of the carriage, leaped
a fence, and I may add, leaped out of sight, in order to conceal my
emotion. I was no sooner lost to view, than, seating myself on a fragment
of rock, I wept like a child. How long I sat