ance that he shortly
afterward disposed of all his Grayville property that remained to him,
turned his back upon the scene of his prodigality and went off across
the sea in one of his own ships. But the gossips who got their
inspiration most directly from Heaven declared that he went in search of
a wife--a theory not easily reconciled with that of the village
humorist, who solemnly averred that the bachelor philanthropist had
departed this life (left Grayville, to wit) because the marriageable
maidens had made it too hot to hold him. However this may have been, he
had not returned, and although at long intervals there had come to
Grayville, in a desultory way, vague rumors of his wanderings in strange
lands, no one seemed certainly to know about him, and to the new
generation he was no more than a name. But from above the portal of the
Home for Old Men the name shouted in stone.

Despite its unpromising exterior, the Home is a fairly commodious place
of retreat from the ills that its inmates have incurred by being poor
and old and men. At the time embraced in this brief chronicle they were
in number about a score, but in acerbity, querulousness, and general
ingratitude they could hardly be reckoned at fewer than a hundred; at
least that was the estimate of the superintendent, Mr. Silas Tilbody. It
was Mr. Tilbody's steadfast conviction that always, in admitting new old
men to replace those who had gone to another and a better Home, the
trustees had distinctly in will the infraction of his peace, and the
trial of his patience. In truth, the longer the institution was
connected with him, the stronger was his feeling that the founder's
scheme of benevolence was sadly impaired by providing any inmates at
all. He had not much imagination, but with what he had he was addicted
to the reconstruction of the Home for Old Men into a kind of "castle in
Spain," with himself as castellan, hospitably entertaining about a score
of sleek and prosperous middle-aged gentlemen, consummately good-humored
and civilly willing to pay for their board and lodging. In this revised
project of philanthropy the trustees, to whom he was indebted for his
office and responsible for his conduct, had not the happiness to appear.
As to them, it was held by the village humorist aforementioned that in
their management of the great charity Providence had thoughtfully
supplied an incentive to thrift. With the inference which he expected to
be drawn from that