ties, which were the product of Captain Howard's farm. Whether
this was true or not I am not prepared to say, but I suppose it was,
for it was told by those who had no ostensible business except to
attend to other people's affairs, and I am sure they ought to have
known all about it, and probably did.

I cannot help thinking that Captain Howard made a mistake in sending
Carrie away; for when at the end of three years she had "finished her
education," and returned home, she was not half so good a scholar as
some of those who had pored patiently over their books in the old
brown house. Even _I_ could beat her in spelling, for soon after she
came home the boys teased for a spelling school. I rather think they
were quite as anxious for a chance to go home with the girls as they
were to have their knowledge of Webster tested. Be that as it may,
Carrie was there, and was, of course, chosen first; but _I_, "little
crazy Jane," spelled the the whole school down! I thought Carrie was
not quite so handsome as she might be, when with an angry frown she
dropped into her seat, hissed by a big, cross-eyed, red-haired boy, in
the corner, because she _happened_ to spell pumpkin, "_p-u-n pun k-i-n
kin, punkin_." I do not think she ever quite forgave me for the pert,
loud way in which I spelled the word correctly, for she never gave any
more calicos or silks, and instead of calling me "Mollie," as she had
before done, she now addressed me as "Miss Mary."

Carrie possessed one accomplishment which the other girls did not. She
could play the piano most skilfully, although as yet she had no
instrument. Three weeks, however, after her return a rich man, who
lived in the village which was known as "Over the River," failed, and
all his furniture was sold at auction. Many were the surmises of my
grandmother, on the morning of the sale, as to what "Cap'n Howard
could be going to buy at the _vandue_ and put in the big lumber
wagon," which he drove past our house.

As the day drew to a close I was posted at the window to telegraph as
soon as "Cap'n Howard's" white horses appeared over the hill. They
came at last, but the long box in his wagon told no secret. Father,
however, explained all, by saying that he had bid off Mr. Talbott's
old piano for seventy dollars! Grandma shook her head mournfully at
the degeneracy of the age, while sister Anna spoke sneeringly of Mr.
Talbott's cracked piano. Next day, arrayed in my Sunday red merino and
white a