Not only in public but in private rejoicings, is the table the scene of chief enjoyment.  When was it that the fatted calf was killed?  On what occasion was the water turned into wine?  What better way to rejoice over the return of a long-absent one than to meet him around the hospitable table?  Ye gods! let your mouths water!  There’s a feast ahead for our brave soldiers, when they come home from this war, that will make your tables look beggarly.  I refer to that auspicious moment when the patriot now baring his bosom to the bloody brunt of war, shall sit down once more to the table, in his own dear home, however humble, and partake of the cheerful meal in peace, with his wife and his little ones about him.  Oh! for the luxury of that first meal!  I almost feel as if I could endure the hardships of the fierce campaign that precedes it.

There is no memory so pleasant to me as that of the annual reuenion of my aunts and uncles, with their respective troops of cousins, at the house of my dear grandmother of blessed memory.  It was pleasant to watch the conveyances one by one coming in, laden with friends who had traveled many a weary mile to be present on the great occasion.  It was pleasant to witness the mutual recognitions of brothers and sisters with their respective wives and husbands; to observe the transports of the little fellows, in their hearty greetings, after a twelve months’ separation, and to hear their expressions of mingled surprise and delight on being introduced to the strange little cousins, whose presence increased the number considerably above the preceding census.  But the culminating point was yet to come.  That was attained when all the brothers and sisters had gathered around the great long table, just as they did when they were children, with their dear mother at the head, surveying the scene in quiet enjoyment, and one of the ‘older boys’ at the foot, to ask a blessing.  There were the waffle-cakes, baked in the irons which had furnished every cake for that table for the last quarter of a century.  There was the roast-turkey, which grandma had been putting through a generous system of dietetics for weeks, preparatory to this occasion.  It rested on the same old turkey-plate, with its two great birds sitting on a rose-bush, and by its side was the great old carving-knife, which had from time immemorial been the instrument of dissection on such occasions.  And there was maple-molasses from Uncle D——­’s ‘sugar-camp,’ and cheese from Aunt N——­’s press, and honey from Uncle T——­’s hives, and oranges which Aunt I——­, who lived in the city, had provided, and all contained in the old-fashioned plates and dishes of a preceding generation.

I discover I am treating my subject in a very desultory manner.  Perhaps I should have stated that under the head of the complete genus,