As my fire-guards heard me returning with my sister and some gentlemen of the town, they left the room, the door slammed, a breeze blew the light from the candles to the curtains, and in an instant the curtains were ablaze.
And now the unbelievable sequel.

The room seemed all on fire in five minutes.

Next, the overhead beam was blazing.

I can tell you that the fire was extinguished by those gentlemen, and no one ever knew we had been so near a conflagration until three years later when the kind lady of the house wrote to me: "Dear Friend, did you ever have a fire in your room?
In making it over I found some wood badly scorched." I have the most reliable witnesses, or you would never have believed it.
In the morning my hostess said to the girls assembled at breakfast: "Miss Sanborn is always rather noisy when she has guests, but I never did hear such a hullabaloo as she made last evening." It is certain that President Seelye deserves all the appreciation and affectionate regard he received.

He has won his laurels and he needs the rest which only resignation could bring.