CHAPTER ONE
I was on the threshold, so to speak, of thirty when my Uncle Ezra gave his first evidence of being aware of my existence by leaving me a competency. He had never seen me, nor I him, and he mis-spelled my very name several times in the course of his will; but, nevertheless, he contrived, in this manner, to awaken in me what I may call a posthumous affection for him, which I have carefully cherished ever since. The justice of this sentiment will be clear when I say that by this fortuitous turn of his pen the estimable old gentleman had made practicable the most ardent desire of my heart.
I was utterly and consumedly weary of being a single man. I aspired to enter a more admired and more admirable estate; to have
