idedly a
wholesome, whole-hearted, chirruping little woman, as ever gladdened
man's heart withal.

"Ruth, this friend is Eliza Harris; and this is the little boy I told
thee of."

"I am glad to see thee, Eliza,--very," said Ruth, shaking hands, as if
Eliza were an old friend she had long been expecting; "and this is thy
dear boy,--I brought a cake for him," she said, holding out a little
heart to the boy, who came up, gazing through his curls, and accepted it
shyly.

"Where's thy baby, Ruth?" said Rachel.

"O, he's coming; but thy Mary caught him as I came in, and ran off with
him to the barn, to show him to the children."

At this moment, the door opened, and Mary, an honest, rosy-looking girl,
with large brown eyes, like her mother's, came in with the baby.

"Ah! ha!" said Rachel, coming up, and taking the great, white, fat
fellow in her arms, "how good he looks, and how he does grow!"

"To be sure, he does," said little bustling Ruth, as she took the child,
and began taking off a little blue silk hood, and various layers and
wrappers of outer garments; and having given a twitch here, and a pull
there, and variously adjusted and arranged him, and kissed him heartily,
she set him on the floor to collect his thoughts. Baby seemed quite used
to this mode of proceeding, for he put his thumb in his mouth (as if
it were quite a thing of course), and seemed soon absorbed in his own
reflections, while the mother seated herself, and taking out a long
stocking of mixed blue and white yarn, began to knit with briskness.

"Mary, thee'd better fill the kettle, hadn't thee?" gently suggested the
mother.

Mary took the kettle to the well, and soon reappearing, placed it over
the stove, where it was soon purring and steaming, a sort of censer of
hospitality and good cheer. The peaches, moreover, in obedience to a few
gentle whispers from Rachel, were soon deposited, by the same hand, in a
stew-pan over the fire.

Rachel now took down a snowy moulding-board, and, tying on an
apron, proceeded quietly to making up some biscuits, first saying to
Mary,--"Mary, hadn't thee better tell John to get a chicken ready?" and
Mary disappeared accordingly.

"And how is Abigail Peters?" said Rachel, as she went on with her
biscuits.

"O, she's better," said Ruth; "I was in, this morning; made the bed,
tidied up the house. Leah Hills went in, this afternoon, and baked bread
and pies enough to last some days; and I engaged to go back t