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MY AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

I was born on the 28th day of May 1827 - in Chapel Hill,
North Carolina - my father being at the time Professor of
Modern Languages & Belles Lettres in the State University at
that place. He was born in Versailles, 3 miles from Paris in
France, on the 26th of July 1797; his father, having been an
active and prominent Republican, was amongst the many who were
proscribed or banished, on the restoration of Louis Philippe.
They came to this country in 1816 - Some on my grandfather's
children remained in France, but most of them accompanied him
to this country -; They set sail from Havre de Grace on the
bark Eugene - Capt. d'Estebacke - on the 22nd of January -
arriving in New York on the 19th of March - I get these data
from an old parchment covered volume which is now before me,
the entries written in the French language, and in the cramped
hand writing peculiar to foreigners.

They remained in New York 8 days, "awaiting the execution
of the formalities necessary to obtain their effects from the
vessel & the custom house. They then spent three weeks in
Elizabeth Town, awaiting the wagon that was to take them to
Berwick Pa - They arrived in Berwick on the 17th of April,
and on the 1st of May went to housekeeping in a house belonging
to a Mr. Brane -, situated on the banks of the Susquehanna &c.
How strikingly do these accounts of plodding and delay contrast
with the rapid transit of the present day - My grandfather,
I think, remained in Berwick, or Wilkesberry until his death