Her cousin looked at her a minute, and then turning her eyes from the light, obeyed her first request and went fast asleep.

A little while after the door opened and Elizabeth stood in the kitchen.  It was already in beautiful order.  She could sec the big dresser now, but the tin and crockery and almost the wooden shelves shone, they were so clean.  And they shone in the light of an opposite fire; but though the second of June, the air so early in the morning was very fresh; Elizabeth found it pleasant to take her stand on the hearth, near the warm blaze.  And while she stood there, first came in Karen and put on the big iron tea-kettle; and then came Mrs. Landholm with a table-cloth and began to set the table.  Elizabeth looked alternately at her and at the tea-kettle; both almost equally strange; she rather took a fancy to both.  Certainly to the former.  Her gown was spare, shewing that means were so, and her cap was the plainest of muslin caps, without lace or bedecking; yet in the quiet ordering of gown and cap and the neat hair, a quiet and ordered mind was almost confessed; and not many glances at the calm mouth and grave brow and thoughtful eye, would make the opinion good.  It was a very comfortable home picture, Elizabeth thought, in a different line of life from that she was accustomed to, —­ the farmer’s wife and the tea-kettle, the dresser and the breakfast table, and the wooden kitchen floor and the stone hearth.  She did not know what a contrast she made in it; her dainty little figure, very nicely dressed, standing on the flag-stones before the fire.  Mrs. Landholm felt it, and doubted.

“How do you like the place, Miss Haye?” she ventured.

To her surprise the answer was an energetic, “Very much.”

“Then you are not afraid of living in a farm-house?”

“If I don’t like living in it, I’ll live out of it,” said Elizabeth, returning a very dignified answer to Winthrop’s ‘good-morning’ as he passed through the kitchen.

“Are you going down to Cowslip’s mill, Governor?” said Mrs. Landholm.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You will lose your breakfast.”

“I must take the turn of the tide.  Never mind breakfast.”

“Going down after my trunks?” said Elizabeth.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’ll go too.  Wait a minute!”

And she was in her room before a word could be said.

“But Miss Haye,” said Mrs. Landholm, as she came out with bonnet and shawl, “you won’t go without your breakfast?  It will be ready long before you can get back.”

“Breakfast can wait.”

“But you will want it.”

“No —­ I don’t care if I do.”

And down she ran to the rocks, followed by Asahel.