“Well, now, I’m sure I’ve forgot what I was going to tell you.  O, yes; about grandmother dreaming about father when he come home from sea.  Well, to go back to the first of it, gran’ther never was rugged; he had ship-fever when he was a young man, and though he lived to be so old, he never could work hard and never got forehanded; and Aunt Hannah Starbird over at East Parish took my sister to fetch up, because she was named for her, and Melinda and Tobias stayed at home with the old folks, and my father went to live with an uncle over in Riverport, whom he was named for.  He was in the West India trade and was well-off, and he had no children, so they expected he would do well by father.  He was dreadful high-tempered.  I’ve heard say he had the worst temper that was ever raised in Deephaven.

“One day he set father to putting some cherries into a bar’l of rum, and went off down to his wharf to see to the loading of a vessel, and afore he come back father found he’d got hold of the wrong bar’l, and had sp’ilt a bar’l of the best Holland gin; he tried to get the cherries out, but that wasn’t any use, and he was dreadful afraid of Uncle Matthew, and he run away, and never was heard of from that time out.  They supposed he’d run away to sea, as he had a leaning that way, but nobody ever knew for certain; and his mother she ’most mourned herself to death.  Gran’ther told me that it got so at last that if they could only know for sure that he was dead it was all they would ask.  But it went on four years, and gran’ther got used to it some; though grandmother never would give up.  And one morning early, before day, she waked him up, and says she, ’We’re going to hear from Matthew.  Get up quick and go down to the store!’ ‘Nonsense,’ says he.  ‘I’ve seen him,’ says grandmother, ’and he’s coming home.  He looks older, but just the same other ways, and he’s got long hair, like a horse’s mane, all down over his shoulders.’  ‘Well, let the dead rest,’ says gran’ther; ’you’ve thought about the boy till your head is turned.’  ’I tell you I saw Matthew himself,’ says she, ’and I want you to go right down to see if there isn’t a letter.’  And she kept at him till he saddled the horse, and he got down to the store before it was opened in the morning, and he had to wait round, and when the man came over to unlock it he was ’most ashamed to tell what his errand was, for he had been so many times, and everybody supposed the boy was dead.  When he asked for a letter, the man said there was none there, and asked if he was expecting any particular one.  He didn’t get many letters, I s’pose; all his folks lived about here, and people didn’t write any to speak of in those days.  Gran’ther said he thought he wouldn’t make such a fool of himself again, but he didn’t say anything, and he waited round awhile, talking to one and another who came up, and by and by says the store-keeper, who was reading a newspaper that had just come, ’Here’s some news for you, Sands, I do believe!  There