ated my neighbor. "Was anything like this ever
heard?"

"She evidently borrowed on your credit and mine--both ways," I
remarked with a smile, for all my unkind feelings toward Mrs. Jordon
were gone, "and for her own benefit."

"But isn't it dreadful to think of, Mrs. Smith? See what harm the
creature has done! Over and over again have I complained of your
borrowing so much and returning so little; and you have doubtless
made the same complaint of me."

"I certainly have. I felt that I was not justly dealt by."

"It makes me sick to think of it." And Mrs. Jordon sank into a
chair.

"Still I don't understand about the wash-boiler and tubs that you
mentioned," she said, after a pause.

"You remember my ten tumblers," I remarked.

"Perfectly. But can she have broken up my tubs and boiler, or
carried them off?"

On searching in the cellar we found the tubs in ruins, and the
wash-boiler with a large hole in the bottom.

I shall never forget the chagrin, anger, and mortification of poor
Mrs. Jordon when, at her request, Bridget pointed out at least
twenty of my domestic utensils that Nancy had borrowed to replace
such as she had broken or carried away. (It was a rule with Mrs.
Jordon to make her servants pay for every thing they broke.)

"To think of it!" she repeated over and over again. "Just to think
of it! Who could have dreamed of such doings?"

Mrs. Jordon was, in fact, as guiltless of the sin of troublesome
borrowing from a neighbor as myself. And yet I had seriously urged
the propriety of moving out of the neighborhood to get away from
her.

We both looked more closely to the doings of our servants after this
pretty severe lesson; and I must freely confess, that in my own
case, the result was worth all the trouble. As trusty a girl as my
cook was, I found that she would occasionally run in to a neighbor's
to borrow something or other, in order to hide her own neglect; and
I only succeeded in stopping the the evil by threatening to send her
away if I ever detected her in doing it again.

CHAPTER XXIX.

EXPERIENCE IN TAKING BOARDERS.

I HAVE no experiences of my own to relate on this subject. But I
could fill a book with the experiences of my friends. How many poor
widows, in the hope of sustaining their families and educating their
children, have tried the illusive, and, at best, doubtful experiment
of taking boarders, to find themselves in a year or two, or three,
hopelessly involved in de