e ladder, and
bring up the basket and fix it firmly, and that without shaking the
figs; whereas, had you left it alone, altogether, I could have
brought up the empty basket and fixed it close by my hand, without
any trouble at all."

"You are an ungrateful boy, and you know how bad it is to be
ungrateful! And after my making myself so hot, too!" Miriam said.
"My face is as red as fire, and that is all the thanks I get. Very
well, then, I shall go into the house, and leave you to your own
bad reflections."

"You need not do that, Mary. You can sit down in the shade there,
and watch us at work; and eat figs, and get yourself cool, all at
the same time. The sun will be down in another half hour, and then
I shall be free to amuse you."

"Amuse me, indeed!" the girl said indignantly, as she sat down on
the bank to which John had pointed. "You mean that I shall amuse
you; that is what it generally comes to. If it wasn't for me I am
sure, very often, there would not be a word said when we are out
together."

"Perhaps that is true," John agreed; "but you see, there is so much
to think about."

"And so you choose the time when you are with me to think! Thank
you, John! You had better think, at present," and, rising from the
seat she had just taken, she walked back to the house again,
regardless of John's explanations and shouts.

Old Isaac chuckled, on his tree close by.

"They are ever too sharp for us, in words, John. The damsel is
younger than you, by full two years; and yet she can always put you
in the wrong, with her tongue."

"She puts meanings to my words which I never thought of," John
said, "and is angered, or pretends to be--for I never know which it
is--at things which she has coined out of her own mind, for they
had no place in mine."

"Boys' wits are always slower than girls'," the old man said. "A
girl has more fancy, in her little finger, than a boy in his whole
body. Your cousin laughs at you, because she sees that you take it
all seriously; and wonders, in her mind, how it is her thoughts run
ahead of yours. But I love the damsel, and so do all in the house
for, if she be a little wayward at times, she is bright and loving,
and has cheered the house since she came here.

"Your father is not a man of many words; and Martha, as becomes her
age, is staid and quiet, though she is no enemy of mirth and
cheerfulness; but the loss of all her children, save you, has
saddened her, and I think she must of