“After all, we might ’s well be comfortable while we visit,” she commented simply, when they found themselves adjusted as of old, “‘n’ come to think it over I really did hear quite a piece o’ news in town.  Mrs. Duruy says she’s set Felicia Hemans to makin’ Sam some shirts ‘n’ Sam is runnin’ the sewin’-machine for ’em.  Now o’ course ’f it comes to such doin’s the first day any one can figger on a week ahead, ‘n’ I had a good mind to say ’s much to Mrs. Duruy, but then I thought if I had it in me to do any warnin’ I’d best warn Felicia, ‘n’ as far ’s my experience goes a woman afore she marries a man always admires him full ’s much or maybe even more ‘n’ his own mother can, so it’s breath wasted to try ‘n’ tell either of ’em a plain truth about him.  Now you know, Mrs. Lathrop, ’s I was never one to waste my breath, so when Mrs. Duruy said ‘s she was thinkin’ o’ goin’ over to Meadville to visit her cousin, now ’s she had somebody to keep her house for her, I jus’ remarked as I hoped she’d get her house back when she come back ‘n’ let it go at that.  Mrs. Allen was in after mail, ‘n’ she said Brunhilde Susan was in bed, ‘n’ the cow was all milked for the night, ‘n’ her mind was easy over ’em both; ‘n’ Gran’ma Mullins was to the drug-store after some quinine to put on little Jane’s thumb.  She says this week as she has little Jane she ‘ll jus’ cure her o’ thumb-suckin’ once an’ f’r all time by keepin’ it dipped in quinine.

“I didn’t see none o’ the others, but I didn’t hear o’ their bein’ in difficulties, so I come home.  Mrs. Macy says Roxana sits ‘n’ weeps straight along, but she says she didn’t have no choice as to her drawin’, for between her bein’ No. 9 ‘n’ only havin’ a trundle-bed Roxana was just forced right down her throat, so she ain’t botherin’ over her a tall.  She come out to make calls this afternoon, ‘n’ she says she sh’ll see to her own marketin’ same ’s ever, ‘n’ Roxana c’n weep or not weep to suit herself.”

“I’m glad you—­” said Mrs. Lathrop thoughtfully.

“I am too,” said Susan quickly, “I’m glad ‘n’ I sh’ll always stay glad.  I just had that one time o’ carin’ for children, ‘n’ the Lord dealt me a lion instid of a baby, ‘n’ I ’m free to confess ’t I’ve never seen no occasion to say other than Thy Will be Done.  The sparrows do build awful in the notches of that lion, ‘n’ the nest in his mouth aggravates me so I d’n’ know what to do some days, but still when all’s said ‘n’ done a sparrow’s nest in the mouth of your father’s tombstone ain’t any such trial as gettin’ a child to bed nights ‘n’ keepin’ its hands clean would be.  ‘N’ if I had adopted a child, Mrs. Lathrop, I sh’d cert’nly ‘a’ kept it clean, f’r, if you’ll excuse me remarkin’ it right in your face, I was raised to wash ‘n’ dust ‘n’ be neat.  That’s why that nest in my lion’s mouth with the straws stickin’ every way do try me so.  Mr. Kimball ‘s forever askin’ me if the lion ‘s raisin’ a beard against the winter, ‘n’ the other day he said