se her hair curls, 'n' she's handsome, 'n' light
complected, 'n' cunning, 'n' a girl (whatever that amounts to is more 'n
I know!), and that blessed boy is tread under foot as if he warn't no
better 'n an angleworm! And do you mean to tell me you don't see the
Lord's hand in this hull bus'ness, Vildy Cummins? There's other kinds o'
meracles besides buddin' rods 'n' burnin' bushes 'n' loaves 'n' fishes.
What do you s'pose guided that boy to pass all the other houses in this
village 'n' turn in at the White Farm? Don't you s'pose he was led?
Well, I don't need a Bible nor yit a concordance to tell _me_ he was.
_He_ didn't know there was plenty 'n' to spare inside this gate; a
great, empty house 'n' full cellar, 'n' hay 'n' stock in the barn, and
cowpons in the bank, 'n' two lone, mis'able women inside, with nothin'
to do but keep flies out in summer-time, 'n' pile wood on in
winter-time, till they got so withered up 'n' gnarly they warn't hardly
wuth getherin' int' the everlastin' harvest! _He_ didn't know it, I say,
but the Lord did; 'n' the Lord's intention was to give us a chance to
make our callin' 'n' election sure, 'n' we can't do that by turnin' our
backs on His messenger, and puttin' of him ou'doors! The Lord intended
them children should stay together or He wouldn't 'a' started 'em out
that way; now that's as plain as the nose on my face, 'n' that's
consid'able plain as I've ben told afore now, 'n' can see for myself in
the glass without any help from anybody, thanks be!"

"Everybody 'll laugh at us for a couple o' soft-hearted fools," said
Miss Vilda feebly, after a long pause. "We'll be a spectacle for the
whole village."

"What if we be? Let's be a spectacle, then!" said Samantha stoutly.
"We'll be a spectacle for the angels as well as the village, when you
come to that! When they look down 'n' see us gittin' outside this
dooryard 'n' doin' one o' the Lord's chores for the first time in ten or
fifteen years, I guess they'll be consid'able excited! But there's no
use in talkin', I've made up my mind, Vildy. We've lived together for
thirty years 'n' ain't hardly hed an ugly word ('n' dretful dull it hez
ben for both of us!), 'n' I sha'n't live nowheres else without you tell
me to go; but I've got lots o' good work in me yit, 'n' I'm goin' to
take that boy up 'n' give him a chance, 'n' let him stay alongside o'
the thing he loves best in the world. And if there ain't room for all of
us in the fourteen rooms o' t