I could hardly help laughing myself; but I begged Monaghan to convey the horrid creature away, and putting some salt and sulphur into a tin plate, and setting fire to it, I placed it on the floor in the middle of the room, and closed all the doors for an hour, which greatly assisted in purifying the house from the skunkification.  Bell then washed out the closet with strong ley, and in a short time no vestige remained of the malicious trick that Uncle Joe had played off upon us.

The next day, we took possession of our new mansion, and no one was better pleased with the change than little Katie.  She was now fifteen months old, and could just begin to prattle, but she dared not venture to step alone, although she would stand by a chair all day, and even climb upon it.  She crept from room to room, feeling and admiring everything, and talking to it in her baby language.  So fond was the dear child of flowers, that her father used to hold her up to the apple-trees, then rich in their full spring beauty, that she might kiss the blossoms.  She would pat them with her soft white hands, murmuring like a bee among the branches.  To keep her quiet whilst I was busy, I had only to give her a bunch of wild flowers.  She would sit as still as a lamb, looking first at one and then another, pressing them to her little breast in a sort of ecstacy, as if she comprehended the worth of this most beautiful of God’s gifts to man.

She was a sweet, lovely flower herself, and her charming infant graces reconciled me, more than aught else, to a weary lot.  Was she not purely British?  Did not her soft blue eyes, and sunny curls, and bright rosy cheeks for ever remind me of her Saxon origin, and bring before me dear forms and faces I could never hope to behold again?

The first night we slept in the new house, a demon of unrest had taken possession of it in the shape of a countless swarm of mice.  They scampered over our pillows, and jumped upon our faces, squeaking and cutting a thousand capers over the floor.  I never could realise the true value of Whittington’s invaluable cat until that night.  At first we laughed until our sides ached, but in reality it was no laughing matter.  Moodie remembered that we had left a mouse-trap in the old house; he went and brought it over, baited it, and set it on the table near the bed.  During the night no less than fourteen of the provoking vermin were captured; and for several succeeding nights the trap did equal execution.  How Uncle Joe’s family could have allowed such a nuisance to exist astonished me; to sleep with these creatures continually running over us was impossible; and they were not the only evils in the shape of vermin we had to contend with.  The old logs which composed the walls of the house were full of bugs and large black ants; and the place, owing to the number of dogs that always had slept under the beds with the children, was infested with fleas.  It required the utmost care to rid the place of these noisome and disgusting tenants.