The
town clerk in my boyhood had been a wealthy old bachelor for
whom the young ladies had set their caps in vain for two generations.
One day he astonished the congregation by proclaiming: "There
is a marriage intended between Dr. Abiel Keywood"--which
was his own name--"and Miss Lucy P. Fay, both of Concord."
That was before I can remember, as his boys were about my
age.
Doctor Ripley, the minister in Concord, was an old man who
had been settled there during the Revolutionary War and was
over the parish sixty-two years. He was an excellent preacher
and scholar, and his kindly despotism was submitted to by
the whole town. His way of pronouncing would sound very queer
now, though it was common then. I well remember his reading
the lines of the hymn--
Let every critter jine
To praise the eternal God.
Scattered about the church were the good gray heads of many
survivors of the Revolution--the men who had been at the bridge
on the 19th of April, and who made the first armed resistance
to the British power. They were very striking and venerable
figures, with their queues and knee-breeches and shoes with
shining buckles.
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