is far past
restrainin' himself. I see Polly White afterward an' she says it's
gospel truth as he's took indelible ink an' tattoed Emma all over
himself, even places where he had to do it by guess or a mirror."

"My heavens!" ejaculated Mrs. Lathrop.

"Well, I should say so," said Susan, "an' will you only consider, Mrs.
Lathrop, what Emma Sweet is to be tattoed all over any man like that! I
like all the Sweets an' I like Emma, but it's only in reason as I should
regard her with a impartial eye, an' no impartial eye lookin' her way
could ever in reason deny as she don't appear likely to set no rivers
afire. Emma's a nice girl, an' if her toes turned out an' her teeth
turned in I don't say but what she might go along without bein' noticed
in a crowd, but with them teeth an' toes all you can call her is
good-hearted an' you know as well as I do as bein' called good-hearted
is about the meanest thing as anybody can ever call anybody else. Folks
in this world never call any one good-hearted unless they can't find
nothin' else good to say of 'em, for it stands to reason as any sensible
person'd rather have anythin' else about 'em good before their heart,
for it's way inside an' largely guesswork what it is anyhow.

"They say as Mrs. Sweet says as even though Emma's her own child, still
she can't see no reason for Henry Ward Beecher's March-haredness. She
says Emma's best p'ints is her gettin' up early an' the way she puts her
whole soul into washin' an' bread-kneadin', but she says Henry Ward
Beecher ain't sensible enough to appreciate good p'ints like those. She
says she's talked to Emma an' any one with half a eye can see as it
ain't Emma as needs the talkin' to. She says Emma says as the way he
hangs onto her goin' home from choir practice is enough to pull her
patience all out of proportion. She says Emma says she'd as soon have a
garter-snake seein' her home, an' doin' itself up in rings around her
all the while, an' Mrs. Sweet says any one as has ever seen Emma seein'
a garter-snake would consider Henry Ward Beecher's chances as very slim
after a remark like that.

"Mr. Kimball says he wishes he had n't took him into his store just now;
he says no young man ain't got a call to the grocery trade when he's in
a state of heart as won't let him hear the call o' the man as owns the
business, an' Mr. Kimball says when he fell into the vat where he was
stirrin' up his dried apples, Henry Ward Beecher never heard one single