A Forced-Marriage Scheme Defeated

Goshen, Conn.—A Lady Stranger There—A Pilgrimage to Goshen Via the Far-Famed Mountain Town of Litchfield—The Beautiful Widow—An Unpleasant Reminiscence of Dr. Ives, Late Bishop of North Carolina—More About the Widow—She Leaves for New York—At the “Mansion House,” Litchfield—A Marked Character Encountered There—Mr. “C. B. Le Roy” Studied and Weighed—The Beautiful Widow and Le Roy Meet—Her Face Discloses Conflicting Emotions—Mr. Le Roy and the Beautiful Widow, Mrs. Stevens, Take a Walk Down South Street, in the “Paradise Of Loafers “—Sympathies Silently Exchanged—We All Start for the “Station”—The Stage-Coach “Turns Over”—The Affrighted Le Roy Reveals his Manners—A Peculiar Scene in the Cars—At Bridgeport I Present Myself to Mrs. Stevens—At New York Again a Tale of Complications Mrs. Stevens in Deep Trouble—A Friend of hers Seeks Me—Revelations—A Fearful Story—A Secret Marriage and Unhappy Consequences—The Wretch Le Roy Wants the Widow’s Money—A Trap Set for Le Roy—He Falls into It—The Wedding Scene Disarranged—The Widow Saved, and the Intended Forced Marriage Defeated

by George McWatters

In the summer of 185-, I had occasion to visit my brother, who was a clerk in a wholesale grocery store of one Lyman, on Water Street, I think, and who, being consumptively inclined, had, at Mr. Lyman’s suggestion, and through his kindness, gone to the town of Goshen, Litchfield County, Connecticut, to spend a few weeks in the genial family of Mr. Lyman’s father, and taste the bracing air of the hills of Litchfield County, so far-famed. So delighted was my brother with his “country home,” as he called it, that he wrote me as often as once a week, and sometimes twice, varying his letters, in the enthusiasm with which they were filled over the mountain scenery, the fresh air, the… Read More