Nobody

"I cannot tell you. I do not know. A great many."

"Did you drink any, Lois?"

"No, aunt Anne."

"I suppose they thought you were a real country girl, because youdidn't?"

"Nobody thought anything about it. The servants brought the wine; everybody did just as he pleased about taking it."

"What did you have to eat, Lois, with so much to drink?" asked herelder sister.

"More than I can tell, Charity. There must have been a dozen largedishes, at each end of the table, besides the soup and the fish; and noend of smaller dishes."

"For a dozen people!" cried Charity.

"I suppose it's because I don't know anythin'," said Mr.Hotchkiss, – "but I always du hate to see a whole lot o' things beforeme more'n I can eat!"

"It's downright wicked waste, that's what I call it," said Mrs. Marx;"but I s'pose that's because I don't know anythin'."

"And you like that sort o' way better 'n this 'n?" inquired uncle Timof Lois.

"I said no more than that it was prettier, uncle Tim."

"But du ye?"

Lois's eye met involuntarily Mrs. Barclay's for an instant, and shesmiled.

"Uncle Tim, I think there is something to be said on both sides."

"There ain't no sense on that side."

"There is some prettiness; and I like prettiness."

"Prettiness won't butter nobody's bread. Mother, you've let Lois goonce too often among those city folks. She's nigh about sp'iled for aShampuashuh man now."

"Perhaps a Shampuashuh man will not get her," said Mrs. Barclaymischievously.

"Who else is to get her?" cried Mrs. Marx. "We're all o' one sort here; and there's hardly a man but what's respectable, and very few thatain't more or less well-to-do; but we all work and mean to work, and wemostly all know our own mind. I do despise a man who don't do nothin',and who asks other folks what he's to think!"

"That sort of person is not held in very high esteem in any society, Ibelieve," said Mrs. Barclay courteously; though she was much amused, and was willing for her own reasons that the talk should go a littlefurther. Therefore she spoke.

"Well, idleness breeds 'em," said the other lady.

"But who respects them?"

"The world'll respect anybody, even a man that goes with his hands inhis pockets, if he only can fetch 'em out full o' money. There was sucha feller hangin' round Appledore last summer. My! didn't he try mypatience!"

"Appledore?" said Lois, pricking up her ears.

"Yes; there was a lot of 'em."

"People who did not know their own minds?" Mrs. Barclay asked, purposely and curiously.

"Well, no, I won't say that of all of 'em. There was some of 'em knewtheir own minds a'most too well; but he warn't one. He come to meonce to help him out; and I filled his pipe for him, and sent him tosmoke it."

"Aunt Anne!" said Lois, drawing up her pretty figure with a mostunwonted assumption of astonished dignity. Both the dignity and theastonishment drew all eyes upon her. She was looking at Mrs. Marx witheyes full of startled displeasure. Mrs. Marx was entrenched behind awhole army of coffee and tea pots and pitchers, and answered coolly.

"Yes, I did. What is it to you? Did he come to you for help too?"

"I do not know whom you are talking of."

"Oh!" said Mrs. Marx. "I thought you did. Before I'd have you marrysuch a soft feller as that, I'd – I'd shoot him!"

There was some laughter, but Lois did not join in it, and withheightened colour was attending very busily to her supper.

"Was the poor man looking that way?" asked Mrs. Barclay.

"He was lookin' two ways," said Mrs. Marx; "and when a man's doin'that, he don't fetch up nowhere, you bet. I'd like to know what becomesof him! They were all of the sort Lois has been tellin' of; thought adeal o' 'prettiness.' I do think, the way some people live, is a way toshame the flies; and I don't know nothin' in creation more useless thanthey be!"

Mrs. Marx could speak better English, but the truth was, when she gotmuch excited she forgot her grammar.

"But at a watering-place," remarked Mrs. Barclay, "you do not expectpeople to show their useful side. They are out for play and amusement."

"I can play too," said the hostess; "but my play always has somemeaning to it. Did I tell you, mother, what that lady was doing?"

"I thought you were speaking of a gentleman," said quiet Mrs. Armadale.

"Well, there was a lady too; and she was doin' a piece o' work. It wasa beautiful piece of grey satin; thick and handsome as you ever see; and she was sewin' gold thread upon it with fine gold-coloured silk; fine gold thread; and it went one way straight and another way round, curling and crinkling, like nothin' on earth but a spider's web; allover the grey satin. I watched her a while, and then, says I, 'What areyou doin', if you please? I've been lookin' at you, and I can't makeout.' 'No,' says she, 'I s'pose not. It's a cover for a bellows.' 'Fora what?' says I. 'For a bellows,' says she; 'a bellows, to blow thefire with. Don't you know what they are?' 'Yes,' says I; 'I've seen afire bellows before now; but in our part o' the country we don't cover'em with satin.' 'No,' says she, 'I suppose not.' 'I would just like toask one more question,' says I. 'Well, you may,' says she; 'what isit?' 'I would just like to know,' says I, 'what the fire is made ofthat you blow with a satin and gold bellows?' And she laughed a little.' 'Cause,' says I, 'it ought to be somethin' that won't soil a kidglove and that won't give out no sparks nor smoke.' 'O,' says she,'nobody really blows the fire; only the bellows have come into fashion, along with the fire-dogs, wherever people have an open fireplace anda wood fire.' Well, what she meant by fire dogs I couldn't guess; but Ithought I wouldn't expose any more o' my ignorance. Now, mother, howwould you like to have Lois in a house like that? – where people don'tknow any better what to do with their immortal lives than to make satincovers for bellows they don't want to blow the fire with! and dish updinner enough for twelve people, to feed a hundred?"

"Lois will never be in a house like that," responded the old ladycontentedly.

"Then it's just as well if you keep her away from the places where theymake so much of prettiness, I can tell you. Lois is human."

"Lois is Christian," said Mrs. Armadale; "and she knows her duty."

"Well, it's heart-breakin' work, to know one's duty, sometimes," said

Mrs. Marx.

"But you do not think, I hope, that one is a pattern for all?" saidMrs. Barclay. "There are exceptions; it is not everybody in the greatworld that lives to no purpose."

"If that's what you call the great world, I call it mighty small, then. If I didn't know anything better to do with myself than to worksprangles o' gold on a satin cover that warn't to cover nothin', I'd godown to Fairhaven and hire myself out to open oysters! and think I madeby the bargain. Anyhow, I'd respect myself better."

"I don't know what you mean by the great world," said uncle Tim. "Bethere two on 'em – a big and a little?"

"Don't you see, all Shampuashuh would go in one o' those houses Loiswas tellin' about! and if it got there, I expect they wouldn't give ithouse-room."

"The worlds are not so different as you think," Mrs. Barclay went oncourteously. "Human nature is the same everywhere."