e a famous itinerant preacher came into
their neighborhood. They, being the greatest people in the place,
invited him to stay at their house during his visit. He often preached
in the open air. One day, at the end of one of those eloquent
discourses, a young man in countryman's dress came up and asked him to
marry himself and a young woman whom he had been waiting upon a long
time, but who had refused to be married unless this very preacher could
perform the ceremony. 'She said it would be a blessed wedlock of your
joining,' pursued the young fellow. The preacher, although he was a
great man, was only human,--it is well, I suppose, that we never outgrow
our humanity,--and felt flattered by the young girl's belief in his
sanctity. He proposed the next day for the ceremony, and was arranging
to marry the rustic couple on the lawn before the house of his host when
the young man interrupted him by stating that it must be gone through
with immediately, for his lady-love was so shy that it was with
difficulty she had been persuaded to come to-night, and she would never
consent if he gave her all that time to think the matter over in, nor
would she be willing to come up on the lawn with the great people. She
was at hand with one of her friends; everything was prepared; would he
marry them then? At that moment? The bewildered minister looked up the
road before him, where the carriage of the Capulets was disappearing at
the top of the hill; he had been told that the daughter would remain
with him, and that the carriage would return as soon as Mamma Capulet
had made inquiries about a cottager who was ill; for his congregation
had been crowding about him with questions and tearful confessions of
sins, and the good Capulets, who had the opportunity to make their
confessions in private, were in haste to be gone. Where was his fair
companion? He looked about him; he had lost sight of her in the throng.
But in a few moments she came forward, accompanying the bride, who the
groom explained was a protegee of hers. Miss Capulet had drawn down her
veil, and in answer to this statement nodded to the reverend gentleman
and murmured an assent. The bride's face, too, was hidden by her bonnet
and by her shyness, which prevented her from once looking up. The name
of the groom lingered with surprise on the minister's lips, for it was
not a clodhopper's name, I assure you; but he had heard nothing of the
love affair. When he came to the bride's nam