I will, on
my part, see to these three small bundles, and my parasol. Doubtless we
shall go on smoothly as need be, only I am afraid you won't be able to
think up many sermons on the highway. There! I forgot the jar of
currant-jelly to go to Ruth Hoyt's aunt! However, we must manage
somehow. You are sure our names are down at the stage-office?"
But, like Charles XII., "after Pultowa's dreadful day," when the
tale-teller listened for his sympathy,
"The king had been an hour asleep."
I am ashamed to say that I must have lost myself after that, though I
thought I was only thinking of the Day of Judgment. But I must have
dreamed it, or how should I have thought it the last trumpet, when it
was only the stage-driver's warning knock?
It was delightful to hear the knock, and the simultaneous clang of pots
and pans which assured us, that, though night had been no night to us,
the dark morning would usher in our breakfast with coffee by the
faithful Polly. The driver coming in again before we had finished, we
seduced him without scruple into taking a cup of boiling comfort, while
we guiltily collected the waifs and strays of our multifarious luggage.
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