'He didn't will me no thirds at all; he | educating. Some instinct warned her to left me use an' privilege for my nateral life of everything that was his'n, and all to go to Mindwell when I'm gone.'

'll do for all I want. I suppose I had | corner cupboards were set open to display ought to have a new gown to be married the old china and glass that filled them; in. When I was married to Ethan, I had there was a "bow-pot" of great red peoa white dimity gown and a blue levan- nies, abundant and riotous with color tine petticoat; and if he didn't fetch me a and fatness, set under the chimney in the big bunch of sand-violets-they was blos- well-whited fire-place; and a few late roses somin' then-for to match my eyes and my glowed in a blue china jar on the high skirt, he said; but that's past and gone, as mantel-piece. On a square table with a the hymn-book says. I do want to have leaf lay a legal paper, that Sam was readone good gown, Mindwell; and now I'm a ing, with his hands supporting his head, little along in years, I guess I'll have a as if it was hard to understand the docudark one. T'other night, when we was ment. up to Squire Barnes's to tea, Miss Barnes was telling about a piece of plum-colored paduasoy Mr. Battle bought in Har'ford for 'Lecty's weddin' gown, and she wouldn't hev it. She said 'twasn't lively enough, and so she's set her mind on a blue levantine; but I should think the plum-color would become me real well."

So the plum-colored silk was bought; and arrayed in its simple folds, with a new worked collar and a white satin bow, the widow Gold was dressed for her second wedding.

Did she think, as she looked into her oval mirror that morning, what a different vision was this quiet, elderly, sober woman, in decent but not festal garments, from the smiling, blushing, blue-eyed creature, in her spotless dimity gown opening over a blue petticoat, and clasped at the throat with a bunch of still bluer violets? What does a woman think who is married the second time? A man is satisfied that now his house will be kept once more, his clothes mended, his whims humored, his table spread to his taste, and his children looked after. If it is needful, he can marry six wives, one after the other. They are a domestic necessity. The Lord himself says it is not good for man to be alone; but it is quite another thing for the woman. Such a relation is not a movable feast to her; it is once for all; and if circumstance or pique betray her into this faithlessness, what does she think of herself when it becomes inevitable?

The widow Gold did not tell. She was paler when she turned from the glass than when she looked into it, and she trembled as she went down stairs to sign the papers before Parson Roberts should arrive.

The best parlor was opened to-day. The high-backed chairs with old brocade cushions that had belonged to Sam Pratt's grandmother were ranged along the wall like a row of stiff ghosts; the

The deacon, in his Sunday garments, was looking at him askance; and Mindwell, with the little girls, Ede and Sylvia, clinging to her gown, was staring out of the window, down the road-staring but not seeing, for the splendid summer day that lavished its bloom and verdure and odor on these gaunt New England hills, and hid their rude poverty with its royal mantle, was all a dim blur to the heartwrung woman.

66

Mother," said Sam Pratt, raising his head, "do you know what's the sum and substance of these here papers; and do you agree to't?"

The widow glanced aside at Deacon Flint, and caught his "married eye," early as it was to use that ocular weapon. Why, yes, Samwell. I don' know but what I do," she said, slowly and rather timidly.

"Well," said Sam, rising and pushing the paper away, "if you do, why, then you're goin' right into't, and it's right, I s'pose; but, by Jinks! I think it's the d—”

Mindwell's touch on his arm arrested. the sentence. "There's Parson Roberts, Samwell; you jest help him out of the gig, will you? He's quite lame, I see.”

Sam Pratt went, with the half-finished sentence on his lips. He was glad his wife had stopped him, on many accounts, but he did long to give Deacon Flint his own opinion of that preliminary contract.

He indulged himself for this deprivation after the stiff and somewhat melancholy wedding was over, and the staid couple had departed for Bassett in the Deacon's wagon, by freeing his mind to his wife.

"Miss Pratt, I was some riled to hev you stop me when I was a-goin' to tell the deacon what I thought about that there contrack; but I don't never stay riled with you, marm, as you'd ought to know by this time;" and Sam emphasized this state

ment with a hearty kiss. "Besides, I will own on second thoughts I was glad you did stop me, for it's no use pinchin' your fingers in a pair o' nippers; but I do say, now and here, it was the darndest piece o' swindlin' I ever see, done under a cover of law an' gospel, you may say, for the deacon had stuck in a bit of Scripter so's to salt it like. He's got the best of the bargain, I tell ye, a long sight. I'm real glad your father went and fixed that prop'ty so she has the use on't only, for she wouldn't have two cents in two years' time, if she'd had it to do with what she's a mind to."

"I

"I'm glad he did," said Mindwell. have felt as though mother would be better suited if she did have it to do what she liked to with: but if this was to happen, why, it's as good she is provided for: she can't want for nothing now."

"I guess she'll want for more'n money, and mabbe for that too. The paper says she's to have her livin'; now that's a wide word; folks can live on bread and water, I expect, and he can't be holden for no more than he's a mind to give."

"Oh, Sam, you don't think Deacon Flint would grudge her a good living? Why, if he is near, as folks tell he is, he's a professor of religion."

"I'd a durned sight ruther he was a practicer on't, Miss Pratt. Religion's about the best thing there is, and makin' believe it is about the wust. I b'lieve in Amasy Flint's religion jest so far forth as I hear him talk, an' not a inch further. I know he'll pinch an' shave an' spare to the outside of a cheese rind; and I haven't no great reason to think he'll do better by Mother Gold than he does by himself." Mind well turned away, full of foreboding, and Sam, following her, put his arm about her and drew her back to the settle.

"Don't worry, dear; she's made her bed, and she's got to lie on't; but after all it's the Lord who lets folks do that way, so's to show 'em, I expect, that beds ain't always meant to sleep on, but sometimes to wake folks up. We're kind of apt to lie long an' get lazy on feathers. I expect that's what's the matter with me. I'll get my husks by-and-by, I guess."

Mindwell looked up at him with all her heart in her eyes, but she said nothing, and he gave a shy laugh: their deep love for each other was a fountain shut up," | and so far no angel had rolled away the

stone and given it visible life; it was still voiceless and sleeping.

Before her wedding day was over Mrs. Flint's new life began, for Polly Morse had been sent off the night before, being the end of an even week, lest she might charge ninepence for an extra day; so her successor without wages had to lay aside her plum-colored silk, put on a calimanco petticoat and short gown, and proceed to get supper, while Polly, leaning over the half-door of the old red house which she shared with the village tailoress, exchanged pungent remarks with old Israel on the topic of the day in Bassett.

"No, they didn't make no weddin', Isr'el; there wa'n't nobody asked, nor no loaf-cake made for her; he wouldn't hear to't, noway. I'd have staid and fixed up for her to-day, but he was bound I shouldn't. As for me, I'm most amazin' glad to get hum, now I tell ye. I'd a sight ruther be in Simsbury prison for a spell, if it wa'n't for the name on't."

"Say, Polly, do you call to mind what I said three weeks back about Miss Flint comin' home? Oh, ye do, do ye? Well, I ain't nobody's fool, be I? I guess I can see through a millstone, providin' the hole's big enough, as well as the next man. I'm what ye may call mighty obsarvin', now. I can figger consider'ble well on folks, ef I can't on 'rithmetic, and I know'd jest as well when I see him rigged up in his Sabba'-day go-to-meetin's, and his nose p'inted for Colebrook, what he was up to, as though I heerd him a-askin' her to hev him."

"Well, I never did think Sarepty Gold would demean herself to have him. She's got means and a real good home, and Mindwell sets a sight by her, and so does Sam Pratt; but here she's ben an' gone an' done it. I wouldn't ha' thought it, not if th' angel Gabriel had have told me on't!"

"Guess he's in better business than goin' round with Bassett gossip, anyhow; but what was you so took back by ? Lordy! I should think you was old enough to git over bein' surprised at women-folks; them and the weather is two things I don't never calc'late on. You can't no more tell what a woman 'll do, 'specially about marryin', than you can tell which way in the road a pig 'll go; onless you work it back'ard, same as some folks tell they drive a pig, and then 'tain't reel reliable-they may go right ahead when you don't a mite expect it."

That is one thing about men, I allow, Isr'el; you can always tell which way they'll go for sartain, and that is after their own advantage, an' nobody else's, now an' forever."

"Amen! They'd be all fools, like me, if they didn't," assented the old man with a dry chuckle as he drove off his empty cart. Yet, for all his sneers and sniffs, neither Polly nor the new Mrs. Flint had a truer friend than Israel; rough as he was, satiric as a chestnut burr that shows all its prickles in open defiance, conscious of a sweet white heart within, his words only were bitter, his nature was generous, kindly, and perceptive; he had become the peripatetic satirist and philosopher that he was out of this very nature,

savin' of meat; but it pompers up the flesh, too good livin' does, and we hev got to give an account, ye know. I don't mean to have no wicked waste laid to my account."

So she left out half the shortening from her crust, and felt ashamed to see the tough substance this economy produced. Next came the sugar question :

"We buy too much sweetenin', Sarepty. There's a kag of tree molasses down cellar. I expect it's worked some, but you jest take an' bile it up, an' stir consider❜ble saleratus into 't, an' it 'll do. I want to get along jest as reasonable as we can. Willful waste makes woful want, ye know."

Yet in his own way the deacon was greedy enough. He had the insatiable appetite that belongs to people of his figure far more often than to the stout.

"He's a real racer," said Uncle Israel, reverting to his own experience in pigs— "slab-sided an' lank. I bet you could count his ribs this minnit; and that's the

and they won't do ye no credit. I never see a man could punish vittles the way he can; but there ain't no more fat to him than there is to a hen's forehead."

Mrs. Flint was not "hungry nor hankering," as she expressed it, but a reasonable eater of plain food; but the deacon's mode of procedure was peculiar.

and free with the freedom of independent poverty to express pungently what he felt poignantly, being in his own kind and measure the "salt of the earth" to Bassett. But in spite of comment and pity, the thing was a fixed fact. Mrs. Flint's mar-kind you can feed till the day after never, ried life had begun under new auspices, and it was not a path of roses upon which she had entered. Her housekeeping had always been frugal, with the thrift that is or was characteristic of her race; but it had been abundant for the wants of her family. The viands she provided were those of the place and period, simple and primitive enough; but the great brick oven was well filled with light bread of wheat and rye both; pies of whatever material was in season, whose flaky crust and wellfilled interiors testified to her knowledge of the art; deep dishes of baked beans, jars of winter pears, pans of golden sweet apples, and cards of yellow gingerbread, with rows of snowy and puffy biscuit. Ede and Sylvia knew very well where to find crisp cookies and fat nut cakes, and pie was reiterated three times a day on Sam Pratt's table.

It was a part of her "pride of life" that she was a good housekeeper, and Mindwell had given her the widest liberty; but now the tide had changed. She soon found that Deacon Flint's parsimony extended into every detail. Her pies were first assailed:

"Sarepty, don't make them pies o' your'n so all-fired rich. They ain't good for the stomach; besides, they use up all the drippin's, and you had ought to make soap next month. Pie is good, and I think it's

"Say, Sarepty, don't bile but a small piece o' pork with that cabbage to-day. I've got a pain to my head, an' I don't feel no appetite, an' cold pork gets eat up for supper when there ain't no need on't."

Obeying instructions, the small piece of
fat pork would be cooked, and, once at
the table, transferred bodily to the dea-
con's plate.
"Seems as though my appe-
I guess 'twas

tite had reelly come back.
a hungry headache." And the tired wo-
man had to make her dinner from cab-
bage and potatoes, seasoned with the salt
and greasy water in which they had been
cooked.

There were no amusements for her out of the house. The younger people had their berrying frolics, sleigh-rides, kitchen dances, nuttings, and the like, and their elders their huskings, apple bees, and sewing societies, but against all these the deacon set his hard face.

"It's jest as good to do your own extry chores yourself as to ask folks to come an' help. That costs more'n it comes to.