gain as she turned toward the house.

There was little time given the child to indulge her feelings, or to
speculate upon a friend's confusion or adieus, for a sharp voice summoned
her to the house and fresh duties.

"When I call you I want you to step spry," was the greeting the child
received from the stooped figure putting the potatoes over the fire to
fry, as she entered the door.

Mrs. Farnshaw had her head tied up in a white cloth; "the spell" had
arrived. It was no time to tell of the loss of the flax, and Luther's
going was not mentioned, because Mrs. Farnshaw shared the public contempt
for his nationality and had failed to get her daughter's confidence in
that quarter.

"Here, set this table for me; I'm clear done out. Did you ever hear of
such a crazy thing as all them hoppers comin' down like bees? Your pa's
gone over to Hansen's t' see what he thinks. Looks 's if we'd be harder up
'n ever, an' I thought I'd done 'bout all th' savin' a woman could do
a'ready. I'm goin' t' get right off t' mother's soon's ever we can sell
that flax. If I don't, we'll be havin' t' use th' money for feed."

Her daughter made no reply. It was no time, when her mother was having one
of her periodical sick-headaches, to let it be known that there was no
flax to sell. That flax had been one long series of troublesome worries,
to which the total loss was a fittingly tragic end. The restless
grasshoppers outside were forgotten.

Some weeks before, Mr. Farnshaw had given a grudging consent to the use of
the proceeds from the flax crop for a trip' to his wife's old home while
her mother yet lived. Josiah Farnshaw's temper was an uncertain quantity.
Had Mrs. Farnshaw been wise she would have dropped all reference to the
flax when the promise was obtained. But Mrs. Farnshaw had to talk; it was
her fate. She had hovered about the field, she had centred her faculties
on the considerations of harvesting, and prices. She laboriously and
obviously collected eggs, skimped the family on its supply of butter, and
had counted her chickens to see how many she could sacrifice for the
purchase of "a decent bit of black."

As she sewed upon the premature emblems of her coming woe, she had
discussed the desirability of threshing out of the shock instead of
waiting for the stack to go through the sweating process; she talked,
talked, talked, with an endless clacking, till her husband fled from her
presence or cut her short with an oath. He wished