Ypsilanti sentinel. [volume] (Ypsilanti, Washtenaw Co., Mich.) 1843-1900, 1846-12-30
CHAPTER II.

| he was good judge of character; and be wa
not at all surprised when, upon reaching home
he found Ephraim as much at ease with his vii
and daughter as if he had been born in the hous
| and as graceful and unconstrained in his man
ners as the necessary awkwardness inseparabl
| from growing limbs and the restraint of a fore
castle would admit. The voyage he made wa
long one, for the ssThree Sisters had beel
one of the first vessels to profit oy the cessdtio
of hostilities with England, and her owner ha
kept her busily at work from port to port, AM
island to island, making her share of the harv
est which the reopening of foreign commerce
offered.
MIR. Marsden, if not Yankee, was quit
shrewd enough to cross quill, which is th
commercial lance, with any man north of Lons
Island Sound or south of il. He drew Ephrain
into conversation,and found that neither his eye
nor his ears had been idle during his maritime
experience, and he suggested to him that h,
should leave his fathers schooner and his doubt
full position at once, and take desk in his coun
ting room, Mr.. nj. himself undertaking to make
all right with the parent. Ephraim was, o.
course, nothing averse to this arrangements
If he had been at home and his father had offe
red him place in the counting room, the re-
suit would have been different. Fear of the
jokes of his companions and former playmates
nay, even of the young women, would have
driven him to sea again. Few young men in
New-England, thirty, or even twenty years age
could muster courage to come under the stigma
of having skilled sailor,'' as deserving the sea
was called. 1t was held hardly less dishonora-
BILE than running away from an enemy in the
field.
Miss Mary Marsden, Only daughter of the
merchant, considered our young friend de-
lightful oddity. She had become tired of all
who grew up in her "set," and who had, of
course, planned and squared all their thoughts
and actions down to the conventionalisms of
the place in which they grew, Ephraim, with
out intending it,passed with her for an original
though he was just as wearisomely like 9TH
er Boston boys as the Philadelphians were like
each other. But the bit of granite beside Penn
sylvia marble, though unnoticeable at home, is
quite lion among limestone. Mary protested
at first sight that he was a shocking clown, but
her vanity was fiattered by his bushes when
she spoke of him; and by the time that Ephraim
had become so much accustomed to her pres
ence as no longer to blush, she had grown so
to him as no more to notice what at
first seemed to her disagreeable-or if she OBJ
served, to cease to dislike them. Perhaps, too,
Ephraim grew more like his neighbors. No
body possesses better aptness of assimilation
in matters of mere fashion than the Yankee
The maxim, 'Do in Rome as Romans do,' if it
lid not originate in New England, is naturalized
here.
In the counting-room the shrewd merchant
ound his Yankee clerk all that he had counted
Upon. He was more than mere clerk, for, as
We have already limited, MIR. Marsden wanted
lin for something more than to flourish his pen
-skillful as was the penmanship of Ephraim
shown to be when he shed the rough, tarry skin
Of his hands, like a pair of worn out gloves, and
recovered the sensitiveness of the balls of his
humb and forefinger. Mr.. AIarsden made
skillful use of the peculiar experience which
MS clerk had obtained in his New England edu-
cation and his long voyage, and turned the con-
versation of Ephraim to very profitable account.
Upon reaching his majority, which he did in a
year or two after his arrival at Philadelphia, the
now free man proposed visit to his father.
'IIow will you gof' asked Marsden, abrupt
y.
"By land think" said Ephraim.
"You don't understand me. Shall it be as
ny clerk, as a discharged clerk with good
character, or as the company OF Peter Marsdcn
4 Co.? Come, you can take your choice"
Ephraim pondered. There were five broth
RS at home, and of the six he was the young
'st. The father had put one in each Of the
hree professionalism were in his fathers
and Ephraim was not long in
lecidng. In the earnestness with which he
bought, he forget attention to forms, and was
he Yankee boy all over as be drawled out
wal, | reckon I'll come in the firm, and very
much obleeged, indeed. don't see-but sup
,ose-wal, blu: you know best
He might have stammered along half an hour
tut M. Marsden broke in upon his half an
wer, have reverie, with a loud laugh. Now,
'eter Marsden seldom laughed at all, and new
r before had Ephraim heard him laugh aloud
nd he looked up surprised. He was still more
stonishcd when Mr.. Peter Marsden, that staid
Id gentleman in top boots, commenced seri-
us of imtations-"You Eph! E-e-e-ph!' he
houted, and then drawled out, in provokingly |
musing tones, the word, Ephraim-Ephrum
in all the varieties of nasal and
intonatiOns, to which our hero had
cen but too we'll accustomed two years before,
n board of the "Three Sisters" Ephraim still
tared in undisguised amazement. He feared
is employer was going mad.
''Mr. Doolittle," said Peter Marsden at length, |
.iping the perspration from his brows with |
is bandana, and settling his collar, as his man |
err was, when be wished to be impressive
Mr.. Doolittle, in the two years that you have
cen here, bave Melted twenty thousand dol
rs"
Now, twenty thousand dollars was consider
rather more than fair two years work thr-
years ago. But what connection this had
18th the vocal gymnastics of his employer, r
hraim could not tell.
Mr.. Marsden proceeded-"l consider that |
rofit as having been mainly derived from my |
tumbling upon so capable and clever Yankee
5 you are. have not made companion OF |
Jerk for nothing, for it was from sundry West
ndia hints that you dropped that fell into the |
hannel which have so successfully followed. |
'ou have taken no undue advantage of the free
ON which l have treated you, and have ever
roved yourself in all respects worthy OF conf
ence."
"Thank you, sir" said Ephraim.
"You will excuse my mimickry just now, for
our manner atthat moment so forcibly brought
ack the Yankee boy that could not helpit.--