The Penn's Grove record., 1883-05-05
My Wedding Tour.


| / was only seventeen when Charlie
| married me, and I wrote myself for the
first time Mrs. Charles Vail, Jr., and
! saw the initials of the same blazoned on
my new Saratoga trunk, when we
started on our wedding journey. MY
wedding Journeys I a speak of it
calmly now, but the time was when 1t
narrowed up nay inmost soul. To this
! day. Charlie becomes wroth when it is
mentioned, and says it is my con
founded Imagination y but he knows,
| and | know well, that that is only n
of those convenient little loopholes
through which big masculinfty can
| crawl on emergency ; and the facts re
manning unchanged and indisputable, |
| shall defy Charlie and state them t.
| the world.
Imagine then, realer or listener,
whoever you may be, that the last
silken train has swept itself out OF
Trinity chapel, and the last note of the
inevitable "Wedding March, shud-
derered itself out Of the Dig grooming
organ, and that Charlie and | are mar
ried. Also, that the kissing and crying
over is achieved, and the voices of my
husbands sisters and my maiden aunts,
hailing down blessings on our heads, are
happily lost in the distance-tlIat the
MY sound we hear is the rattle and
roar of an express traia laundering
eastward, and ! am looking out into
the golden MONDAY watching the fields
and roads and villages and woodlands
race past up, and sweep back into a
| room, like running water. Tnere W,
sat, two blissful young fools--but it
isn't of our bliss or our f~oolishness,
either, that / am going to tell you
only of the single adventure of our
| wedding tour.
Charlie hadn't told me Where we were
to go, and | rather liked being left in
ignorance, knowing no more than that
| we were being swept away to some lit
tie paradise of our own-it might be an
island of the Hebrides, OF Crusoe's
| kingdom, or Eden itself. We stopped
| at a good many stations by the way that
looked anything but paradisical but
saw everything through a glass, rosify,
as j sat there demure and mate, by
| Clarifies side. The shadows were
growing short, and it was just noon,
when we stopped at some 'yille" or
,ther, whose long, low. struggling build
ngs, crowded cl Sc upon the track, and
the broad, dusty village street, branch
ing off at right angles, are photograph led
ipen my memory. Not for anything
intrinsically remarkable there were
only a good many teams and farm
wagons, and open carriages, and light
c~arryalls standing about, with the lazy
horses rubbing against the old worm
eaten posts, under the row of dropping
green trees, and plenty of people on the
PLATFORM, crowding together for gree.'
ing and good-byes; it was a common.
place every day picture enough, and
not even a pretty one, except in frag
ments. There was a general exodus
from the car, and a rush dinnerward,
as we supposed, toward the swinging
sign of some sshousen or other down
the lazy little country street and
Charlie, looking at his watch, said il
was twelve o'clock-and didn't l wan
some lunch?
OF course l didn't, but of course hi
said | must have it, and immediatel,
started up. He wouldn't be five min
ut,s, he said, and | mustn't til
he came back. | was to guard u TIVE
seats and let no M come nigh them
md above all, | was to sit still and no
be led astray by any possible warning
to change ans We're going through,
Charlie remarked, $50 Just keep TIN
seats, and don't pay any attention.
nodded obedience, and Mr.. Val
marched out of the car, leaving me t
peer after him in the crowd and catel
the last glimpse of his straw hat van
ishing down the street.
watched the crowd, when Charli
was out of sight, and unused and won
dered over the faces, and built up al
sorts of dreamy speculations upon tier
} as n does in a crowd when they hav
nothing better to think of. Present.
the door banged open. and the voice
/ some unseen functionary shouted
"ChaAge cars for Boston ~
Everybody began to scramble thai
bags and bundles and canes together
l and there was a rush among the fe'
who remained my fellow passengers.
i watched them go without emotion, an
b merely settled myself more comfortabl
for the solitary journey Through