Upon going nearer and enquiring the cause, I found that a butcher had just been married, and that it is always the custom on such occasions for his brethren by trade to serenade the couple with _marrow-bones_ and _cleavers_.

Perhaps you have heard of the phrase 'musical as marrow-bones and cleavers'; this is the origin of it.

If you wish to experience the sound let each one in the family take a pair of tongs and a shovel, and then, standing all together, let each one try to outdo the other in noise, and this will give you some idea of it.

How this custom originated I don't know.

I hope it is not symbolical of the _harmony_ which is to exist between the parties married." Among those eminent Englishmen to whom young Morse had letters of introduction was Zachary Macaulay, editor of the "Christian Observer," and father of the historian.