hsahpahrillah,"
which she hated, just to mock Amelie's manner; and Amelie, assuming to
be ignorant of Tudie's existence, would retort by ordering "a
strorrburry sody wattur." Then each would laugh recklessly but
miserably.

The church at which the Terriberrys worshiped was almost torn apart by
the matter. The more ardent partisans felt that Amelie's unrepentant
soul had no right in the sacred edifice. Others urged that there should
be a truce to factions there, as in heaven. One Sunday dear old Dr.
Brearley, oblivious of the whole war, as of nearly everything else less
than a hundred years away, chose as his text Judges xii: 6:

"Then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for
he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew
him at the passages of Jordan: and there fell at that time of the
Ephraimites forty and two thousand."

If the anti-Amelites had needed any increase of enthusiasm they got it
now. They had Scripture on their side. If it were proper for the men of
Gilead, where the well-known balm came from, to slay forty-two thousand
people for a mispronunciation, surely the Carthaginians had authority to
stand by their "alturrs" and their "fi-urs" and protect them from those
who called them "altahs" and "fiahs."

No country except ours could foster such a feud. No language except the
chaos we fumble with could make it possible. By and by the war wore out
of its own violence. People ceased to care how a thing was said, and
began to take interest again in what was said. Those who had mimicked
Amelie had grown into the habit of mimicry until they half forgot their
scorn. The old-time flatness and burr began to soften from attrition, to
be modified because they were conspicuous. You would have heard Arthur
subduing his twang and unburring the "r." If you had asked him he would
have told you his name was either "Arthuh" or "Ahthur."

Amelie and her little bodyguard, on the other hand, grew so nervous of
the sacred emblems that they avoided their use. When they came to a word
containing an "a" or a final "r" they hesitated or sidestepped and let
it pass. Amelie fell into the habit of saying "couldn't" for "cahn't,"
and "A. M." for "mawning."

People began to smile when they met her, and she smiled back. Slowly
everybody that had "not been speaking" began speaking, bowing, chatting.
Now, when one of the disputed words drifted into the talk, each tried to
concede a littl