She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose.  They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large wart where it would do the most good.  On Sundays, when she put on shoes, corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she took great pains to wear them properly.  When she reached home, however, she always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles aside with a great sigh of relief.  Miss Mattie’s disposition improved rapidly as soon as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place, resting safely upon the wart.

[Sidenote:  Second-hand Things]

When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic.  “As I was sayin’,” she began, “there ain’t no sense in the books you and your pa has always set such store by.  Where he ever got ’em, I dunno, but they was always a comin’.  Lots of ’em was well-nigh wore out when he got ’em, and he wouldn’t let me buy nothin’ that had been used before, even if I knew the folks.

“I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for almost nothin’ and your pa was as mad as a wet hen.  There was a name on it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly good.  When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad.  While your pa was rampin’ around, he said he wouldn’t have been surprised to see me comin’ home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy.  Who ever heard of a second-hand coffin?  I’ve always thought his mind was unsettled by so much readin’.

“I ain’t a-sayin’ but what some readin’ is all right.  Some folks has just moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster’s wife was a-showin’ me some papers they get, every week.  One is The Metropolitan Weekly, and the other The Housewife’s Companion.  I must say, the stories in those papers is certainly beautiful.

“Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything because the papers hadn’t come, but the postmaster’s wife was readin’ one of the stories and settin’ up nights to do it, so she wa’n’t to blame for not lettin’ ’em go until she got through with ’em.  They slip out of the covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference.

[Sidenote:  The Doctor’s Darling]

“She was tellin’ me about one of the stories.  It’s named Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor’s Darling.  Lovely Lulu is a little orphant who has to do most of the housework for a family of eight, and the way they abuse that child is something awful.  The young ladies are forever puttin’ ruffled white skirts into her wash, and makin’ her darn the lace on their blue silk mornin’ dresses.

“There’s a rich doctor that they’re all after and one day little Lulu happens to open the front-door for him, and he gets a good look at her for the first time.  As she goes upstairs, Arthur Montmorency—­that’s his name—­holds both hands to his heart and says, ’She and she only shall be my bride.’  The conclusion of this highly fascinatin’ and absorbin’ romance will be found in the next number of The Housewife’s Companion.”