e she nearly had a fit. Mrs.
Sperrit had to come in an' be explained to, an' the worst of it was as
Hiram couldn't be woke nohow. He'd pulled the ladder up after him an'
put the lid on the hole so's to feel safe, an' there he was snug as a
bug in a rug an' where no human bein' could get at him. They hollered
an' banged doors an' sharpened the carvin' knife an' poured grease on
the stove an' did anything they could think of, but he never budged.
Mrs. Macy says she never was so close beside herself in all her life
before, for Gran'ma Mullins cried worse 'n ever each minute an' Hiram
seemed like the very dead couldn't wake him.

"They was all hoppin' around half crazy when Mr. Sperrit come along on
his way to the weddin' an' his wife run out an' told him what was the
matter an' he come right in an' looked up at the matter. It didn't take
long for him to unsettle Hiram, Mrs. Macy says. He got a sulphur candle
an' tied it to a stick an' h'isted the lid with another stick, an' in
less 'n two minutes they could all hear Hiram sneezin' an' comin' to.
An' Mrs. Macy says when they hollered what time it was she wishes the
whole town might have been there to see Hiram Mullins come down to
earth. Mr. Sperrit didn't hardly have time to get out o' the way an' he
didn't give his mother no show for one single grab,--he just bounced
into his room and you could have heard him gettin' dressed on the far
side o' the far bridge.

"O' course, us at Lucy's didn't know anythin' a-_tall_ about Mrs. Macy's
troubles. We had our own, Heaven help us, an' they was enough, for the
very first thing of all Mr. Dill caught his pocket on the corner of Mrs.
Dill an' come within a ace of pullin' her off her easel. That would have
been a pretty beginnin' to Lucy's weddin' day if her father had smashed
her mother to bits, I guess, but it couldn't have made Lucy any worse;
for I will say, Mrs. Lathrop, as I never see no one in all my born life
act foolisher than Lucy Dill this day. First she'd laugh an' then she'd
cry an' then she'd lose suthin' as we'd got to have to work with. An'
when it come to dressin' her!--well, if she'd known as Hiram was
sleepin' a sleep as next to knowed no wakin' she couldn't have put on
more things wrong side out an' hind side before! She wasn't dressed till
most every one was there an' I was gettin' pretty anxious, for Hiram
wasn't there neither, an' the more fidgety people got the more they
caught their corners on Mrs. Dill. I j