plaster is loose,
but Mr. Popham will make it all right. Mother says she feels
as if he had pasted laughter and good nature on all the walls
as he papered them. When you open the front door (and we hope
you will, sometime, and walk right in!) how lovely it will be
to look into yellow hayfields! And isn't the boatful of people
coming to the haymaking, nice, with the bright shirts of the
men and the women's scarlet aprons? Don't you love the white
horse in the haycart, and the jolly party picnicking under the
tree? Mother says just think of buying so much joy and color
for twenty cents a double roll; and we children think we shall
never get tired of sitting on the stairs in cold weather and
making believe it is haying time. Gilbert says we are putting
another grand piano leg on the walls, but we are not, for we are
doing all our own cooking and dishwashing and saving the money
that a cook would cost, to do lovely things for the Yellow
House. Thank you, dearest Mr. Hamilton, for letting us live in
it. We are very proud of the circular steps and very proud of
your being an American consul.

Yours affectionately,

NANCY CAREY.

P.S. It is June, and Beulah is so beautiful you feel like eating
it with sugar and cream! We do hope that you and your children
are living in as sweet a place, so that you will not miss this
one so much. We know you have five, older than we are, but if
there are any the right size for me to send my love to, please
do it. Mother would wish to be remembered to Mrs. Hamilton,
but she will never know I am writing to you. It is my first
business letter.

N.C.

XVII

JACK OF ALL TRADES

Mr. Ossian (otherwise "Osh") Popham was covering the hall of the Yellow
House with the hayfield paper. Bill Harmon's father had left
considerable stock of one sort and another in the great unfinished attic
over the store, and though much of it was worthless, and all of it was
out of date, it seemed probable that it would eventually be sold to the
Careys, who had the most unlimited ingenuity in making bricks without
straw, when it came to house decoration. They had always moved from post
to pillar and Dan to Beersheba, and had always, inside of a week, had
the prettiest and most delightful habitation in the naval colony where
they found themselves. Beulah itself, as well as all the surrounding