At a given signal from Captain Ranger, a tall and handsome young Englishman, whose youthful face contrasted strangely with his snowy hair, stepped proudly down the aisle, where he was joined by his radiant bride, leaning on the arm of her father; and the preacher pronounced the words that legalized a union made in heaven. The tears that rose unbidden to the eyes of bronzed and bearded men and toilwom, plainly attired women were tears of joy and peace, good- will and gladness.
A bountiful basket-dinner, contributed, as by a common impulse, from the home of almost every family in the district, was served within the building.
"We leave to-morrow, by steamer from Portland, going by way of San Francisco, Acapulco, and the Isthmus, up the Atlantic coast to New York," said the happy bridegroom, in his post-prandial speech, "whence we shall sail for Liverpool. I shall take my wife to London to visit my mother. Then, on our return to Oregon (for we will make this neighborhood of the Ranch of the Whispering Firs our permanent home), we shall stop over at Washington to see her sisters, — Mrs. Buckingham and Marjorie; and after that we can visit the home of her childhood."
"But I prefer going first to the home of my grandparents, dearest," said the bride. "We can get there easily by the way of the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River and the Illinois, if we'll be on hand before the rivers are frozen over. We can then go on to Washington, and to England afterwards. Don't you think this will be the more economical, convenient, and reasonable plan?"
"As this journey is to be in your honor, it shall be as you say, my bonnie Jean."
The bride blushed and beamed bewitchingly, while the crowd laughed and applauded, and her husband bowed and smiled in approval.
All eyes then turned upon the father, who took the
