o the horse, which
had shaken off his head-stall, and was quietly grazing along the
road-side. A minute or two might have been thus occupied, when the
trotting of a horse and the sound of wheels announced the near approach
of one of those vehicles which have got to be almost national; a
dearborn, or a one-horse wagon. As it came out from behind a screen of
bushes formed by a curvature in the road, I saw that it contained the
Rev. Mr. Warren and his sweet daughter.

The road being narrow, and our vehicle in its centre, it was not
possible for the newcomers to proceed until we got out of the way, and
the divine pulled up as soon as he reached the spot where we stood.

"Good morning, _gentlemen_," said Mr. Warren, cordially, and using a word
that, in _his_ mouth, I felt meant all it expressed. "Good morning,
_gentlemen_. Are you playing Handel to the wood-nymphs, or reciting
eclogues?"

"Neider, neider, Herr Pastor; we meet wid coostomers here, und dey has
joost left us," answered uncle Ro, who certainly enacted his part with
perfect _aplomb_, and the most admirable mimicry as to manner. "_Guten
tag, guten tag_. Might der Herr Pastor been going to der village?"

"We are. I understand there is to be a meeting there of the misguided
men called anti-renters, and that several of my parishioners are likely
to be present. On such an occasion I conceive it to be my duty to go
among my own particular people, and whisper a word of advice. Nothing
can be farther from my notions of propriety than for a clergyman to be
mingling and mixing himself up with political concerns in general, but
this is a matter that touches morality, and the minister of God is
neglectful of his duty who keeps aloof when a word of admonition might
aid in preventing some wavering brother from the commission of a
grievous sin. This last consideration has brought me out to a scene I
could otherwise most heartily avoid."

This might be well enough, I said to myself, but what has your daughter
to do in such a scene? Is the mind of Mary Warren, then, after all, no
better than vulgar minds in general?--and can she find a pleasure in the
excitement of lectures of this cast, and in that of public meetings? No
surer test can be found of cultivation, than the manner in which it
almost intuitively shrinks from communion unnecessarily with tastes and
principles below its own level; yet here was the girl with whom I was
already half in love--and that was saying as li