Then began such a jubilee as this small settlement had never known before. “Brush College” had another holiday, and Master Hempstead became vastly exhilarated—wholly from joy, let us hope. No one, it is said, slept at all that night,—unless a few infants,—and dawn surprised the entire population at the capacious Royce cabin, still listening to the story of that memorable voyage.

Otherwise, too, the arksmen had great news to tell. New Orleans was no longer a Spanish possession, but an American city, where Western keels, arks and barges could go without let or hindrance; and the Mississippi was a free river from St. Louis to the Gulf.

It was then—along toward morning—that Master Hempstead waxed wondrously eloquent, and made a great speech, still remembered, in which, with prophetic vision, he predicted and portrayed the future glories of the middle West.

So much remains to relate that I bring the narrative to a close most reluctantly. The annals of the Royce and Ayer families have it that Milly and Marion made the most remarkable wedding tour of those times, journeying even to Philadelphia and to the new capital city of Washington, where they attended one of President Jefferson’s very democratic receptions. But those things belong to the annals of other years. Our task was but to tell the story of the Ark of 1803.