Thanksgiving, that day of days in New England, had come round again.  Among the thousands by whom it was celebrated as a festive occasion, were the Martins, who resided in a village only a few miles from Boston.  Old Mr. and Mrs. Martin had four children, two sons and two daughters.  One of the daughters remained at home.  Rachel, the oldest of the daughters, was in her twenty-third year; and Martha was nineteen.  The former was married and lived in the village.  Thomas, next older than Rachel, was also married.  He resided ten miles away.  The oldest of them all, William, was a wanderer; or, for ought they knew to the contrary, had long since passed to his great account.  As many as five years had gone by since there had come from him any tidings; and nearly eight years since his place had been vacant at the Thanksgiving re-unions.

The day rose calm and bright on happy thousands.  Perhaps no family in all New England would have experienced a purer delight on this occasion, than that of the Martins, had not the vacant place of an absent member reminded them of the wandering, it might be the lost.  Thomas was there with his gentle wife and three bright children; Rachel with her husband and babe; and Martha with her sweet young face, that was hardly ever guiltless of a smile.  But William was away; and the path in which he was treading, if he were yet alive, was hidden from their view by clouds and darkness.

Dinner, that chiefest event of every Thanksgiving day, was served immediately after the return of the family from church.  It had been prepared by the hands of Martha, and she was in the act of taking an enormous turkey from the oven, when a man came to the door, and, without speaking a word, stood and looked at her attentively.  She noticed him as she turned from the oven.  He was a sad looking object for a New England village on Thanksgiving day.  His eyes were sunken, his face thin and pale, and his old tattered garments hung loosely on his meager limbs.  He looked like one just from a bed of sickness, and he bent, leaning upon a rough stick, like an old man yielding to the weight of years.  Yet, poor and weak as he seemed, his clothes were clean, and his face had been recently shaven.

Struck with his appearance, Martha paused and looked at him earnestly.

“Will you let me rest here for a little while?” said the stranger, as soon as he had attracted Martha’s attention.

“Oh! yes.  Sit down,” replied Martha, whose sympathies were instantly awakened by the man’s appearance.  And she handed him a chair.

Just then, Rachel, who had taken off her things on returning from church, came into the kitchen to assist Martha with the dinner.  She merely glanced at the man; but he fixed upon her a most earnest look, and followed her about with his eyes as she moved from one part of the room to another.

“Martha!” called Mrs. Martin from the adjoining room.  Neither of the sisters saw the start which the man gave, nor observed the quick flush that went over his face, as he turned his head in the direction from which the sound came.