back of his collar and which at that moment came off and dropped on the floor i guess you have to set a in this if you will he said with well feigned indifference and came out from among the pots and very a farmer and meek the button had rolled almost to mrs s feet and when looked for it she stooped and picked it up and handed it to his wife with a heavy sigh and then rose to take leave i shall be ready any time to watch with the old gentleman if he needs it or even thinks he does remarked as if he had heard nothing of what his cousin had said and she did not know how to answer him though usually she was equal to the occasion she went away in doubt whether she had won a great victory or had been defeated and she took the plate of which humbly offered in the old gentleman s behalf hardly knowing what it was she felt so unlike herself all of a sudden but she came to before she was out of sight of the house and though l he hated worse than ever she ate one of the with uncommon relish and put another in her pocket the spring days lengthened and grew into summer and the excitement which attended the knowledge of the transfer of old mr s property died slowly away he looked so and changed by his illness of the winter that it was by no means difficult for the town s people to believe that his mind had become as much as his body as for a farmer his nearest neighbors they saw him rarely for he was too lame to make the short journey to their houses and in the early business of the farms nobody found much time to go visiting or her most husband he was a sly looking faded out little man of no attractions and a manner which disgusted the persons he sought most eagerly to please it had been thought that he would favor some projects about the new road which he frowned upon directly he was in office and that the parties who were most concerned and there grew steadily a feeling of shame and regret that he should have won so easily his prominent position in town affairs he paid the taxes on the farm with unusual and the took notice that he had crossed out mr s name from the tax bill and inserted his own in its place there was a good deal of sympathy felt for the old man because he had not deserved such a miserable son in law people hoped that he was treated well but it was taken for granted in those few weeks that the poor old farmer was fast breaking up and under the circumstances nobody could wish him to live long since it would only involve the greater of old age and a continued suffering of one sort and another as for his a farmer daughter she was making great bids friendship and was showing herself both generous and in a way that much surprised her acquaintances she spoke with great concern of her father s failing health and some persons began to say she was good hearted and what a pity it was that she should have thrown herself away on such a man as she drove old mr to church one hot sunday when was reported to be kept at home by the expected from a hive of bees and it was certainly very kind the way in which she helped him down out of the high wagon and along the broad aisle to his he looked round the church as pleased as a child and seemed to enjoy the unusual opportunity of being among his friends and neighbors f � older people watched him affectionately � he was younger than several who were there � and many of the younger members of the congregation expected him to betray in some way his shattered wits but he seemed to be in full possession of his faculties as far as any one could decide at that time and when found his place in a hymn book and offered it to him he shook his head at her in great perplexity and proceeded to search for the right page in his own copy of and select hymns which was a farmer of large type and for years had been ready to his hand in the corner of the i m all right if it was n t for my he told a half dozen of the friends who crowded about him i can get about a good deal better than the folks think i can too but keeps right after me he added in a lower voice to who had been more pleased than anybody to see his uncle in his accustomed seat and who indulged a hope that now he was about again he would take things into his own hands but the poor man stumbled on the meeting house steps that very sunday and gave himself a bad strain and passed many a long and lonely day afterward in his dark close bedroom in that summer weather out the birds sang and the grass grew and grew until it waved in the wind and was like the sea the old farmer worried and fretted about the crops and could not imagine how the fields got on without his and care he was always calling or the man who had been engaged to help him and demanding strict account of the potatoes and corn and beans he had worked day in and day out on his land until that summer and he was sure everything must be going to wreck and ruin without him some of his questions he thought and treated him like a child if it had not a 