In a day or two Mr. Lincoln and Jenny went back to Boston, bearing with them a long list of articles which Rose must and would have.  As they were leaving the house Mrs Howland brought out her black leathern wallet, and forcing two ten dollar bills into Jenny’s hand, whispered, “Take it to pay for them things.  Your pa has need enough for his money, and this is some I’ve earned along, knitting, and selling butter.  At first I thought I would get a new chamber carpet, but the old one answers my turn very well, so take it and buy Rose every thing she wants.”

And all this time the thankless girl up stairs was fretting and muttering about her grandmother’s stinginess, in not having a better carpet “than the old faded thing which looked as if manufactured before the flood!”

CHAPTER XXIX.

A NEW DISCOVERY.

On the same day when Rose Lincoln left Boston for Glenwood, Mrs. Campbell sat in her own room, gloomy and depressed.  For several days she had not been well, and besides that, Ella’s engagement with Henry Lincoln filled her heart with dark forebodings, for rumor said that he was unprincipled, and dissipated, and before giving her consent Mrs. Campbell had labored long with Ella, who insisted “that he was no worse than other young men,—­most of them drank occasionally, and Henry did nothing more!”

On this afternoon she had again conversed with Ella, who angrily declared, that she would marry him even if she knew he’d be a drunkard, adding, “But he won’t be.  He loves me better than all the world, and I shall help him to reform.”

“I don’t believe your sister would marry him,” continued Mrs. Campbell, who was becoming much attached to Mary.

“I don’t believe she would, either, and for a very good reason, too,” returned Ella, pettishly jerking her long curls.  “But I can’t see why you should bring her up, for he has never been more than polite to her, and that he assured me was wholly on my account.”

“She isn’t pleased with your engagement!” said Mrs. Campbell; and Ella replied, “Well, what of that?  It’s nothing to her, and I didn’t mean she should know it; but Jenny, like a little tattler, must needs tell her, and so she has read me a two hours’ sermon on the subject.  She acted so queer, too, I didn’t know what to think of her, and when she and Henry are together, they look so funny, that I almost believe she wants him herself, but she can’t have him,—­no, she can’t have him,”—­and secure in the belief that she was the first and only object of Henry’s affection, Ella danced out of the room to attend to the seamstress who was doing her plain sewing.