“That is the prettiest wedding I’ve been to for an age, Ned, and I don’t see why, for there wasn’t a bit of style about it,” observed Mrs. Moffat to her husband, as they drove away.

“Laurie, my lad, if you ever want to indulge in this sort of thing, get one of those little girls to help you, and I shall be perfectly satisfied,” said Mr. Laurence, settling himself in his easy chair to rest after the excitement of the morning.

“I’ll do my best to gratify you, Sir,” was Laurie’s unusually dutiful reply, as he carefully unpinned the posy Jo had put in his buttonhole.

The little house was not far away, and the only bridal journey Meg had was the quiet walk with John from the old home to the new.  When she came down, looking like a pretty Quakeress in her dove-colored suit and straw bonnet tied with white, they all gathered about her to say ‘good-by’, as tenderly as if she had been going to make the grand tour.

“Don’t feel that I am separated from you, Marmee dear, or that I love you any the less for loving John so much,” she said, clinging to her mother, with full eyes for a moment.  “I shall come every day, Father, and expect to keep my old place in all your hearts, though I am married.  Beth is going to be with me a great deal, and the other girls will drop in now and then to laugh at my housekeeping struggles.  Thank you all for my happy wedding day.  Goodby, goodby!”

They stood watching her, with faces full of love and hope and tender pride as she walked away, leaning on her husband’s arm, with her hands full of flowers and the June sunshine brightening her happy face—­and so Meg’s married life began.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

ARTISTIC ATTEMPTS

It takes people a long time to learn the difference between talent and genius, especially ambitious young men and women.  Amy was learning this distinction through much tribulation, for mistaking enthusiasm for inspiration, she attempted every branch of art with youthful audacity.  For a long time there was a lull in the ‘mud-pie’ business, and she devoted herself to the finest pen-and-ink drawing, in which she showed such taste and skill that her graceful handiwork proved both pleasant and profitable.  But over-strained eyes caused pen and ink to be laid aside for a bold attempt at poker-sketching.  While this attack lasted, the family lived in constant fear of a conflagration, for the odor of burning wood pervaded the house at all hours, smoke issued from attic and shed with alarming frequency, red-hot pokers lay about promiscuously, and Hannah never went to bed without a pail of water and the dinner bell at her door in case of fire.  Raphael’s face was found boldly executed on the underside of the moulding board, and Bacchus on the head of a beer barrel.  A chanting cherub adorned the cover of the sugar bucket, and attempts to portray Romeo and Juliet supplied kindling for some time.