Year: 1873

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veranda. 1t stood in a forest country
and, with it garden orchard and scrap.
of velvety pasturage, was surrounded .or
many sides by trees climbing on heights
trees dipping and courtesying in hollows
trees wading into the river where the red
sided cattle love to drink, trees lying il
soft heaps against the silver-grays o
cloudland with mysterious blue mist be
hind their holes. The morning glitter wa
on every thing, as the master of the house
going out with his dog, stopped an(
spoke over the low garden wall to hi:
wife, who with hands in her apron
pockets, was standing gazing attentively
at her bee-hives.


''let Fan have the satin for this time
but she must try to do with less. Oul
living is too expensive"


81 have Just been thinking of where we
can eronomize," replied the wife, in al
irritated tone, 1--WE are too many in the
house for one thing. 1t is time that cir
Lola was earning her bread"


"Humph. :" said the husband; II think
She earns it already. She saves you a
nursery governess."


Il can teach the children myself" was
the reply; land their sisters must learn tc
help. Lola gets nothing from us but food
and shelter. 1t would be only fair to let
her 90 INTO the world"


"She's shy thing, and is better where
she is Besides, what would become OF
Grannv's children ?"


The husband and wife had walked slow
ly from the bee-hves to the house, and
stood under lattice window, which lav
open.


"Talking of Granny" said the husband
show long is Gray going to stay at Rose
lands? He's a good deal here, isn't he ?'


Hes very pleasant company"


And our girls are attractive"


Nonsense How little you know OF
your own children! ! have brought up
my girls to have their feelings under pru-
dent control There is no mistake about
his footing in this family"


"Well, I'm glad you're all SO prudent,
for he'd be the better of a good wife.
He's = good fellow, and a clever fellow,
though poor as job"


The porch swallowed the mistress of the
house, and the master went off whstling
and then a face leaned forward and look
ed out of the lattice window, pale, but
with Il sort Of underglow, giving warm
charm to its dimpled softness, with dark
ness and depth about the eyes, and bright
ness about the hair which the sunshine
now Illuminated with u genius for love in
every curve Of it, and sort of golden
light wavering across the steady eyes and
grave though happy mouth.


"lhank God, | am not a young lady ~
murmured Lola, taking her fingers out of
her ears, where she had placed them all
too late. 'What would they think if they
knew what he said to me Yesterday go


She rose up quivering at the recollec-
ton, nearly touching the slant roof with
her head in her pride The room was
dark, and scarcely large enough to hold
Lola and a glass Of flowers and some
wood-cuts framed with plated twigs on
the dimly-lighted walls


lied be the better of a good wife, ''
said Lola, echoing the words that had
come up to her through the ivy, "but he's
poor as Job, and SO the fine ladies leave
him to me. wonder what it would be
like, being a good wife to man as poor
as job. There would be good deal of
scrubbing and tubing, | dare say; but
I'm ready for it if Pm wanted. Thank
heaven | am not delicate !" feeling her





fingers. "I'd as soon cook the dinner as
DO worsted work any day. It's well have
no elegant tastes; making common things
look pretty is the finest have. | have
rather good appetite" (ruetully), "but
then | could live on bread and milk. |
can wash; and | can make clothes. The
smallest, tiniest cottage, an casy-chair
and plain one; wine for him, milk for
me; IN evening lamp, bookcase, garden,
good humor. plenty of flowers"


Loa's thoughts wandered away, and
lost themselves in the delights of the
home she was skctching. She shook her
self out OF her dream with low laugh
of undoubting happiness. "Chicks will
be waiting-Granny will scold!" She ad-
.lusted her white calico dress, plucked a
crimson rose that was hanging over the
sash, and fixed it, with artist fingers, in
her bosom, smoothed willful ripple out
OF her shining hair, took a burned
straw hat t1om peg on the wall, and
went out of the same chamber, and out of
the house.


Granny's house was handsomer than
that nest-like one in which Lola lived on
sufferance. Granny was not rich, but she
liked to keep up certain old-fashioned
grandeur. Indeed, none of the people in
this forest country considered themselves
aspeople who were certainly poor. Granny
must have trips to London, and two horses
in her carriage, and her son, who lived in
the next house, would have been very
well off only that Fan must have her
satin dress, and he his hunters. Lola was
the richest of them all, with her little
lodging for nothing under the ivy, and
her slender wages for teaching two small
orphan cousins, whom Granny had taken
to herself. Lola was the only one among
them who knew how to enjoy her life. <


Lola's way lay through green lane
across fields, over the river on rustic
bridge, and then plunged into wood,
through a blue tunnel followed among
leaves, where the path was moist and
brown with dew. Then she entered Rose
lands, which deserved its name, and went
into the house with the perfume of thou
sands of roses hanging about her. Granny
was willful old lady. who loved lilac
ribbons in her cap, and old china in her
cabinets, and who could scold and pet lit
tie people, and sometimes big people too.
She was somewhat severe upon grown-up
young folks, unless they happened to get
sick. when she became an angel Arthur
Gray was an invalid when she first made
his acquaintance, and people said this was
why she took such fancy to him. He
was a son of distant connection of the
family, dropped by chance into their lives
clever, poor, and with no friends. The
ladies, hearing he was scientific, had at
first stood a little in awe of him, with an
idea that science is uncomfortable but
Gray had been presented to Granny by the
most famous scientific man in London.
We do not say that Granny would not
have been kind to him if she had picked
him up in the gutter, yet the great man
had his weight when he did choose to step
into the scale of the young mans chances
OF finding favor among his kinsfolk


Granny was sitting in her dainty antique
drawing-room at the head of table
drawn up in q cool corner under the shade
OF green blinds, her work-basket before
her. her children on either side with open
books, and Arthur Gray at the foot of the
table, pencil in hand. He was now nc
longer an invalid, and was supposed to be
p!uming his wings for some wonderful
hight IN the regions of scientific discovery
by the sidelong looks of awe which
Granny was casting toward him over the