April 20th, Mary Brown, hired girl living in my family 4 years, taken sick with same disease, died May 2d, Æ 34 years.

April 24, James Henry Stowell (son), same disease and on the 24th had a severe fit-supposed to be dead. Got welldied in N. Y. City, June 12, 1895.

April 26th, Warren Corning (hired boy) attacked by same disease-life expected to cease for 8 days, but survived. He died in Manchester.

April 29, Moses Griffin (hired man-negro), same disease. Was very sick-got well.

Jesse and Hannah Chapine, Mary Brown, Warren Corning and Moses Griffin had severe cases of smallpox.

Dr. Thomas Wallace attended through sickness.

Dr. Jerome O. C. Smith of Boston attended 12 days and nights.

Dr. Wallace gave closest attention and did well.

Mrs. Chase, a sister of C. B. Stowell and a daughter of Colonel Stowell, is now living in Chicago at an advanced age, and is the only surviving member of the family. She lived in Manchester, N. H., in 1834, and although but a small girl at that time acted as nurse to the victims.

William Davis, who imported the smallpox, died in Londonderry, Vt., in April, 1854.

District No. 9, Londonderry, N. H., was visited by smallpox in the sixties. The family of Edward Clark was afflicted. The road was fenced and guarded. No fatalities resulted.

We have tried to present you what we have been able to gather from record and tradition. We believe you will find it substantially correct.

BY WILLIAM E. MOORE.

Those very aged residents present who are old enough to have been alive in 1846, or earlier, will bear witness that the memory of the scenes and events of their childhood and early youth is often more vivid than the recollection of those more recent. It is possible that persons, and especially places, recalled from a distant and rapidly fading past may be colored with a sort of childish exaggeration, but I indulge the hope that nothing is unimportant which relates to early Manchester.

I came from Cambridge, Mass., late in November, 1841, by rail to Nashua, then the terminus, and thence in a sleigh-stage to Manchester, driving directly to the "Old Ark," on Amherst street. In the L extension lived Walter French, Dr. Thomas Brown, and others. Mr. French then kept a periodical store in the basement, afterwards carried on for many years by E. K. Rowell.

Dr. Tom Brown was my uncle, and many will well remember him and his children, Moses, Jacob, Thomas, Lucretia and Mary. The doctor died in 1848 of Asiatic cholera, and the others now are all dead except Moses. The doctor was a noted temperance reformer in his day, and was very widely and unfavorably known by most of the liquor dealers.

Roughly speaking, the settled limits of the town, on the town side, then extended from Merrimack to Bridge street, north and south, and from Elm to Pine street on the east, with here and there many vacant lots, and on the corporation side from Central to Spring street, quite a space between being also vacant.

I well remember the old town house, and the incident of a big dog belonging to Cheney's Express Company crawling from the belfry to the steep roof and being killed by sliding to the sidewalk. I saw in the corner window a wildcat killed on the road to Goffe's Falls. The city was surrounded by woods, north, east and south, mostly hard pine, with large, open and unfenced clearings towards Hallsville, Towlesville and Janesville. The old "rye-field," commonly the circus ground, and the pine plain northeast, where Emerson displayed fireworks for several years, will be recalled.

Doubtless many remember the old sand lots, above Bridge street, afterwards known as "Pigville." From here to the falls. were not more than two or three dwellings, one occupied by Mr. Webber. The small wooden schoolhouse was then standing on the old Falls road. The original McGregor bridge then spanned the river, but was impassible for teams and unsafe for foot travel, but I crossed it more than once when a boy.

Union building had an early and changeful occupancy. Here was the old Athenæum, David Hill, librarian; a debating room where old John Houston, the blacksmith, held his ground against all comers. In disposing of the problem of life he said, "I am, therefore I exist; I exist, therefore I have the right to be." Here also was the office of the Manchester Messenger, and in another room John H. Goodale's Democrat, while in the attic Otis Eastman and a company of stage-struck juveniles rehearsed terrible tragedy. The Jackson Brothers then sold dry goods in the room now occupied by the Manchester bank.

The Methodist church was entered from "cat alley" by a broad flight of stairs, several stores taking up the Elm-street front. Here Simpson & Sargent sold dry goods. Mr. Simpson had an old bachelor brother and a sister on Hanover street, between Chestnut and Pine, as good as they were eccentric, and with this worthy couple I was put out to live for a time.

The Museum, at the corner of Pleasant street, was a large, three-story block. Tewksbury's bookstore held a part of the street front, and up one flight was the museum itself. I remember the high glass cases, in which were a few mounted birds and stuffed animals, and around the room was an assortment of curiosities. The whole collection was meagre, but it never was increased and finally disappeared, I never knew when or where. On the upper floor was the theatre. The seats were raised, there was a good stage, a fine drop curtain of green broadcloth, and a considerable outfit of scenery. Here tragedy, comedy, farce and melodrama by turns held the boards. Here Joe Walker, an elocutionary graduate of Rodney Kendall, made his debut as Cassio, and here John N. Bruce played Roderigo and various other light comedy characters, being particularly effective as Natz Tiek, in the Swiss Cottage. Walter Dignam was first violin and leader of the orchestra.

After the Museum theatre was permanently closed, performances were given for a time in the old Baptist church, which had been metamorphosed into a theatre, the old pews, cushions and all, being thus profanely diverted from their original purpose.

On the east side of Elm street there was a row of cheap wooden buildings, usually a story and a half high, but no two alike, with gable ends to the street. Aside from Shepherd's tavern, Kidder & Dunklee's store, and the City hotel, I remember no brick buildings; on Merrimack street none, on Manchester street one besides the Baptist church and on Hanover street none except Riddle's building. On Amherst and around Concord square, including Vine street, were, so to speak, the houses of the nobility and gentry-all American families, and among them many of the most prominent citizens of the town. Concord square was then cultivated by the abuttors, each having a little plot in which were planted beet, parsnip, carrot, cabbage and onion seeds-never anything

else-and I have an impression that any one surreptitiously putting in a squash seed would have been mobbed.

I well remember seeing the great comet of 1843 from the steps of Dr. Wallace's church, as it nightly shook its horrid hair to the south of the meridian. Hard by this church was, time out of mind, a livery and boarding stable, then kept by Colonel Chase. He had a son John, and two daughters, one a blonde and the other a brunette. I find I have covered but a small fraction of the ground as indicated by my notes, but before closing let us take a stroll up Elm street, and salute a few of our old acquaintances.

The street is unpaved, but the sand is moistened in spots by the one watering cart then in commission, operated by Micajah Ingham. On either hand are groups of loungers who hear the clangor of a bell, followed by the lusty tones of Old Adams, the town crier. A larger crowd opposite Bill Putney's "Eagle" are watching a fight between two bulldogs, the property of the town's butchers, Robinson and Hobbs. The fight goes on for two hours or more, the owners looking on with the rest and no one interfering. As one dog grew tired he would lie still and let the other chew him till he got rested. Then the other dog would be chewed. The fights were frequent, usually ending in a draw, and to this day it has never been decided which was the better dog. A straggling file of men wiggled out of Riddle's building, where the police court had been held by Judge Potter, and among them is old Riddle himself, with his tall silk hat, which he continued to wear until after the close of the Civil war. Finally we halt in front of the Old Ark, the point from which we started. Here we have a chat with Fred Smyth, just then a clerk in a grocery store at a salary of a dollar a week. He is much interested in mesmerism, and will probably ask you to step into the back room and let him put you to sleep. I assume that you have entered and are for the time unconscious, but before you come out of your trance, Time's drop curtain falls.