“What is it, father?”
“All through my life, at home, I have been accustomed to look up to the quality, and the country squires who owned lands, with a sort of awe; and I have been thinking what a pleasant feeling it must be to own a piece of land that God made, and that I should, before I die, like to experience the feeling. Now, I have got a few pounds, that I managed to lay up while in France. Why couldn’t I buy a little piece of land, and have a little garden, and plant it? It would seem so pleasant to eat anything that grew on my own land. But perhaps you’ll think I’m getting childish, and that it’s an old man’s whim.”
“That’s just the way I used to feel at home, father; and when I came to this country, I couldn’t rest for thinking how I should ever come to own a piece of land. I would do it. Sam Edwards has a piece right on the shore he wants to sell. Part of it’s cleared. There’s a small piece between it and me that belongs to heirs, and is to be sold. I’ll buy it, and then yours will join mine.”
“And I shall be a freeholder in my old age, after living a tenant all the best of my life,” said the old gentleman, highly gratified.
“I’ll tell you what you can do, father. Next time the vessel goes to Marseilles, get Jacques to procure some sallies for you, set them on your land, and then you can have an osier holt, grow your own rods, and make all the baskets you like, to pass away the time in the long winters we have in this country.”
“Do you think they would grow here?”
“Anything will grow here, and there’s a swale on that place will suit them exactly.”
The marriage of John Rhines and Fannie Williams added to the general satisfaction. The infare, or second-day wedding, took place at Captain Rhines’s, upon which occasion half the town were invited.
Uncle Isaac and Joe Griffin met Walter and Ned at the infare, and there made an agreement to start the next week for the woods. Ned, who had been kept quite closely at school till he went to sea, and had never in his life shot anything larger than a pigeon or squirrel till he came to Pleasant Cove, was perfectly wild with the anticipation, and kept Walter awake so long talking about it, that he averred, if he didn’t keep still, he wouldn’t sleep with him.
Charlie lent Ned a splendid gun, and they were busily employed running balls and making preparations.