ground was too crowded.
But there was scarcely a moment allowed me for observation; for I had no
sooner walked up to where they were at work than Mrs. Tetchy rose up
quickly, and saluted me with,--

"How did you get in? Wasn't the gate bolted?"

I replied, that, as no one had answered my call at the front door, I
supposed they must be in the garden, and so had taken the liberty of
coming in. I could have feigned some apology inconsistent with
sincerity, but that was not my way. Besides, her manner was so
unexpectedly abrupt as to confuse me. There she stood, with a
garden-trowel in her hand, in working dishabille, and presenting
altogether a needlessly unattractive picture of a female horticulturist;
for, though operating in a garden is really working in the dirt, yet it
does not follow that one must of necessity be dirty herself.

"Do you want anything?" she again asked, in the same snappish tone.

"Yes, Ma'am," I replied,--"I came to see if I could buy a few
strawberry-plants."

"I thought that's what you were going at," she answered, even more
sharply. "That's what your pimping about us comes to. Want to ruin our
business, do you, and have strawberries of your own to sell to our
customers? You can't get any here: we don't sell plants."

The woman's manner forbade all persuasion or argument. Her husband kept
on with his work, saying nothing; she was evidently the master-spirit of
garden as well as household, and I turned away so vexed and indignant as
not even to bid the churl a good-morning. I could hear the mutterings of
her anger to her husband as I walked quickly away, and am half ashamed
to confess, that, as I passed through the gate, I slammed it to with all
the energy of a real spitefulness. Not one of us has ever stepped foot
upon the inhospitable premises of these people since. And Jane so
persistently snubbed the son, that he very soon discovered, that,
instead of being desirous of assuming the name of Tetchy, she would
prefer never to hear it even mentioned.

I have somewhere read of two charming women being once engaged in
discussing the question of what it is that constitutes the beauty of the
human hand. There was difference of opinion, of course, and no really
definite idea of the true elements of beauty. Unable to decide
themselves, they referred it to a gentleman present. His mind went back
to, and wandered over, the classics, exhausting the heathen mythology
for examples and parallels, but h