Mrs. Lyndsay had a sort of satisfaction in the thought that, by these sacrifices of daily comfort, they had secured a properly ordered reception room, and rather increased than diminished the severity of her economy. But Julia tried to remedy all deficiencies as far as inexpensive ingenuity could do it. The old furniture was cleaned and revived, plain curtains were hung, and many little devices employed to give a habitable look to the farm-house. Especially she cared for the garden, which flourished and extended under her management, until the whole descent from the front of the house to the river was bright with flowers and soft grass, in place of the rough growth of underbrush that had disfigured the spaces between the wide-spreading trees.

How far Mrs. Lyndsay had secured her object, of avoiding the gossip of the village, may be imagined by a glimpse at a party, assembled in the house of deacon Peters.

A large patchwork quilt, stretched in the frame, and resplendent with scarlet and green

chintz, was the ostensible object of the gathering; but any one who had heard, not seen, the busy group, would have declared it a solemn conclave, convened to examine and decide upon all questions touching the pretensions, habits, and circumstances, past, present and future, of the new-comers.

"Why, Mrs. Peters, I thought you was going to have the new folks here to-night."

"It ain't my fault, Mrs. Smith. I thought, as we meant to have a little dance, it might be neighborly for the young folks. I see there was two girls in meetin'; so last Monday, Susan and me just went up to ask them. But my! talk about city folks givin' themselves airs. I never see anything to match it."

"Did you go in, Mrs. Peters? How did the old place look?"

"You see, after we got the dinner things put by, we got on our bonnets, and walked out there. It was pretty warm, you know; but the outer door was shut as tight as if it was December. Well, we knocked. They've got

up a new knocker; and by-and-by a Dutch woman comes to the door. Instead of taking us into the sitting-room, she opens the parlor door. I hardly knowed the old place; it looks for all the world like a show-shop-such curtains, and little painty things on the mantelshelf, and little bottles that looked like sugarcandy.

"I couldn't help going up to feel of the curtains, if they was really silk. They must have cost a sight; and while we was looking at them, the door opened, and in walked Mrs. Lyndsay, as grand as you please, in a silk gown with a lace cape over it. It might have been better if she had had a sensible cap on her head, instead of the fancy thing she had pinned on her back hair. Well, she bowed mighty stiff-never even shook hands or asked us to take our bonnets off, but said something about 'not knowing our names,' and 'the servant forgetting

cards.'

"So, says I, 'I'm Deacon Peters' wife, Mrs. Lyndsay, and this is my daughter Susan,' says

I, 'and we're a going to have a quilting o' Wednesday, and a sort of a kintecoy after, and I'd be glad to see your young folks, and you too, if you'd like to come. There'll be lots of the folks round, and it'll be a good time to get acquainted.' Well, she just draws herself up a little stiffer than before, and says she, 'I am much indebted to Mrs. Peters for her polite invitation (just as if she wasn't talking to me), but I regret that it will be impossible for my daughters to accept it.'

"So thinks I, it's hard for the young ones to be kept up so. I'll just try again for a little; and I says, 'Ma'am, if you can't spare 'em all the afternoon, can't they come to tea? and if your old man's too busy to come after 'em, I'll get some of the boys to see 'em home. They'll like it right well, too, to have such pretty girls to walk home with.'

"How that could have affronted her, I don't know; but she looked at me as if she'd eat

me.

"I must beg you to excuse them, Mrs. Pe

ters,' says she. Just then the Dutch girl brought in some cake and wine; and while we took some, Mrs. Lyndsay never said one word, which I thought wa'n't hardly civil; so we come away, and I guess we shan't try it again. I don't like such stuck-up ways."

Now, who'd a thought it !" said Mrs. Smith; "my old man see Lyndsay several times, and he likes him first rate.

city ways, wife,' says he;

man!"

'None of your fine

'he's a real common

"So was the old squire,” added Mrs. Brown, who, no longer able to quilt, was knitting vigorously on a butter-nut colored sock. "The old squire was as plain a man as you'd wish to Butter-nut cloth was good enough for him, and his wife come to meeting in a factory print; but I thought this boy'd be spoiled by his city broughtin' up."

see.

"Boy! aunty Brown, he looks as old as you do now."

"May be, I wear better 'n he does; but he was nothin' more'n a boy when he went