Marie was asked, and very gladly said Yes. The captain had his house set in order; the rooms were newly painted, the garden attended to, the linden pruned; while Marie arranged the stores of linen and plate left by her deceased parents-in-law, with the pleasurable feeling of ownership. And so came the day when the ship was to be launched, and the pair were to be united.
We all went to the dock; my parents conveyed the young pair in a carriage, and the guests followed. We went on board the ship, the young couple preceding, then my parents, and the guests. The vessel was christened by the name of "Young Couple." We all burst out into loud huzzas, swung our glasses and our hats, and hurried from the stern, where the ceremony took place, to the bows, to remain there during the launch. The steps were removed; the ways in which the keel was to run were slushed with soap and tallow; the sound of the ax was heard, knocking away the last blocks; the line was cast off; one blow of an ax, and amid the huzzas of the carpenters, sailors, and spectators, the noble vessel shot into the water. Suddenly a shriek was heard; the bow-line had parted, and the ship, freed from its check, shot across the river, with such momentum that it struck against the opposite shore, and stuck fast.
In itself this was no great matter; for it cost little trouble or expense to tow the vessel back again. But the merriment of the occasion was interrupted by the shriek, and disturbed by the superstitious belief that any accident happening at a launch is a bad sign for the vessel. A silence fell upon the guests; Marie wept, and the captain looked anxious, for all sailors are more or less superstitious. However, after the wedding, we grew cheerful again; the young pair went on to Neumühlen, and the autumn and winter passed away quickly and happily. Sorrowfully they watched the approach of spring, for the ship was afloat, her cargo ready, and the anchor was to be weighed as soon as the Elbe was free from ice.
This took place toward the end of March. For the first time in his life, the captain left Hamburg with tears in his eyes, after having heartily commended to my mother the care of his wife, who was expecting her first child to be born during the course of the summer. If all went well, tidings of his arrival on the coast of Africa might be looked for about the time of her confinement; and he had promised to write as soon as possible, as not only his wife, but our establishment were anxious to receive letters from him.
But long after Marie had given birth to a boy, no tidings had come from her husband. Autumn came and was gone; winter came and went, and yet no intelligence reached us of the ship.
No other vessel had spoken her; she had put in at no other port; not a trace of her could be discovered; and after a year and a day we were forced to conclude that she had gone down with all on board. The grief of the young wife was very deep, though the hope still remained that the crew might have been saved, and that her husband would return. Thus passed years, until finally when all imaginable inquiries had been made in vain, Marie began to grow accustomed to the idea of his loss, and to look upon herself as a widow.
About this time she became acquainted with man who carried on a small business in Neumühlen, and who wished to make her his wife. As Evers had been absent eight years, my parents advised her to consent, especially as they perceived that such was her own inclination. But before a new marriage could be contracted, Evers must be judicially pronounced to be dead. In the present case, after the usual preliminaries, there was no difficulty; and in the year 1828, Marie was married a second time; her son by the first marriage being then in his ninth year.
This marriage also proved to be a very happy one; and she had two children born in the first two years; both of whom survived.
One evening in the autumn of 1830, Marie was holding her youngest child in her arms, while her husband sat by her upon the sofa, enjoying his pipe. The elder boy, the son of Evers, was busy at another table, near which his little sister was playing. A fierce storm was howling without; the rain and hail rattled against the windows; the night was unusually dark; and as some draught was felt, even in the well-secured apartment, Marie told her eldest son to close the shutters. The lad went to the window, but quickly returned, saying that a man was standing there.
"Let him stand," replied the father, and the boy went back to the window to close the shutters, when he found that the man had gone. All was quiet in the room. The boy went back to his occupation; the mother laid her infant in the cradle, put the girl to bed, and had taken up her work-basket, when an old woman burst into the room half out of her wits with excitement, crying, "Madame! Madame! Jan Evers was out there!"