l way,
and in a loud tone full of good-fellowship, as though she would say:

"Certainly, my high old cock! To be sure I will. Don't worry about
it--give your mind no more uneasiness on that subject. I'll bring the
hot water."

She did not know very much, but she was delighted to learn, and she was
very strong. Whatever Euphemia told her to do, she did instantly with a
bang. What pleased her better than anything else was to run up and
down the gang-plank, carrying buckets of water to water the garden.
She delighted in out-door work, and sometimes dug so vigorously in
our garden that she brought up pieces of the deck-planking with every
shovelful.

Our boarder took the greatest interest in her, and sometimes watched her
movements so intently that he let his pipe go out.

"What a whacking girl that would be to tread out grapes in the vineyards
of Italy! She'd make wine cheap," he once remarked.

"Then I'm glad she isn't there," said Euphemia, "for wine oughtn't to be
cheap."

Euphemia was a thorough little temperance woman.

The one thing about Pomona that troubled me more than anything else was
her taste for literature. It was not literature to which I objected, but
her very peculiar taste. She would read in the kitchen every night after
she had washed the dishes, but if she had not read aloud, it would not
have made so much difference to me. But I am naturally very sensitive to
external impressions, and I do not like the company of people who, like
our girl, cannot read without pronouncing in a measured and distinct
voice every word of what they are reading. And when the matter thus read
appeals to one's every sentiment of aversion, and there is no way of
escaping it, the case is hard indeed.

From the first, I felt inclined to order Pomona, if she could not attain
the power of silent perusal, to cease from reading altogether; but
Euphemia would not hear to this.

"Poor thing!" said she; "it would be cruel to take from her her only
recreation. And she says she can't read any other way. You needn't
listen if you don't want to."

That was all very well in an abstract point of view; but the fact was,
that in practice, the more I didn't want to listen, the more I heard.

As the evenings were often cool, we sat in our dining-room, and the
partition between this room and the kitchen seemed to have no influence
whatever in arresting sound. So that when I was trying to read or to
reflect, it was by no means exhilar