The next day I went to board at the Squire’s.  It was dark when I reached the house; the candles were just being lighted.  The Squire, a kindly old man, met me in the porch and took my bundle.  I followed him into the kitchen.  There something more than common seemed to be going on, for chairs were being arranged in rows, and Mrs. Brewster was putting out of sight every article suggestive of work.  There was to be an evening meeting.  I watched the people as they came in, still and solemn.  Not many of the women wore bonnets.  All who lived within a moderate distance just stepped in with a little homespun blanket over the head, or a patchwork cradle-quilt.  I noticed Rachel when she entered and took her seat upon the settle.  It will only take a minute to tell what a settle is, or, rather, was.  If you should take a low wooden bench and add to it a high back and ends, you would make a settle.  It usually stood near the fireplace, and was a most luxurious seat,—­its high back protecting you from cold draughts and keeping in the heat of the fire.  It was now shoved back against the wall.  This neighborhood-gathering was called a conference-meeting, being carried on by the brethren.  I liked to hear them speak, because they were so much in earnest.  The exercises closed with singing “Old Hundred.”  I joined at first, but soon there fell upon my ear such sweet strains from the other side of the room that I was glad to stop and listen.  They came from the settle.  It was Rachel, singing counter.  Only those who have heard it know what counter is, and how particularly beautiful it is in “Old Hundred.”  I think it has already been intimated that I was somewhat poetical.  It will not, therefore, be considered strange, that, when I heard those clear tones, rising high above the harsher ones around, above the grating bass of the brethren and the cracked voices of elderly females, I thought of summer days in the woods, when I had listened to the notes of the robin amid a chorus of locusts and grasshoppers.

Squire Brewster treated Rachel kindly; but women make the home, and Mrs. Brewster was a hard woman.  The neighbors said she was close, and would have more of a cat than her skin.  Miss Sarah had been out of town to school, and was proud.  Sam, the grown-up son, was coarse, but just as proud as his sister.  I disliked the way he looked at Rachel.  Her position in the family I soon understood.  She was there to take the drudgery from Mrs. Brewster, to be ordered about by Miss Sarah, tormented by the younger children, and teased, if not insulted, by Sam.  What puzzled me was her manner towards them.  She spoke but seldom, and, it seemed to me, had a way of looking down upon these people, who were so bent upon making her look up to them.  The cross looks and words seemed not to hit her.  Her deep, dark eyes appeared as if they were looking away beyond the scenes around her.  I was very glad to see, however, that she could notice Sam enough to avoid him; for to that young man I had taken a dislike, and not, as it turned, without reason.