marks.

"I knew that was what they were after!" said Mrs. Tetchy to her husband,
in a voice that was intended for us to hear.

But we kept our backs to them, taking no notice of what they said.

"Another strawberry-garden, I suppose!" exclaimed the daughter, Miss
Annabella Tetchy, who had not yet had the good luck to change her ugly
name.

"Cream, too, no doubt!" added Tetchy himself, in a tone so insulting
that I thought it unworthy of one calling himself a man.

These provoking taunts continued until the spiteful family appeared to
have either relieved themselves or grown tired of having the cold
shoulder of a profound contempt all the time turned toward them. It was
a very hard thing for me to bear this malicious insolence. I could have
retorted keenly on them by some plain insinuation touching their
iron-tailed cow, of which they probably thought that no one but
themselves had any knowledge. But we preserved our self-respect by
maintaining silence.

These little private vexations were about all that we encountered during
the whole progress of our strawberry-planting. The neighbors, with the
exception of the Tetchys, having no particular interest as to how we got
along or whether we got along at all, very soon ceased to take any
notice of what we were doing. The novelty of the new enterprise died
away as speedily, for the season at least, as if we had been sowing
turnips. Under the fine October weather, the plants quickly took root,
and went on growing so vigorously that some of them even put out an
occasional runner. But these were immediately clipped off, as sure to
impair the vigor of the plant, which could now support no extraneous
offshoots. There were some plants, however, that apparently stood still,
refusing to grow, while others died out entirely. But casualties of this
sort are always to be expected. They occur with old hands at
strawberry-planting, and beginners must not think to escape them.

I felt inexpressibly proud of my achievement. I watched this work of my
own hands so closely, being up and in the garden long before breakfast,
that I think the very shape and position of every plant came to be
imprinted on my memory. I know that I could detect the changes that took
place in the look of each particular pet. I thought of them when
operating the treadle of my sewing-machine at the factory, and I hurried
home more expeditiously than aforetime, to enjoy even the brief autumn
twilight among my str