t up?"

"Devilish! Why, Charlie, that's the way mother did it."

"Well," said Charlie, scratching his head and looking foolish, "I know she
did, Lulie, but I'll be confounded if I can stand it much longer."

"Why, Charlie, you used to stand it when mother did it," I answered
maliciously.

"I was hardly ever about the house in those days, Lulie: I suppose that
was why I didn't mind it."

"Why weren't you about the house much in those days, Charlie?"

"Because you weren't in it, you witch, I suppose."

This was such a decided triumph over the old lady of the portrait that I
could afford to be amiable; so, giving him a spasmodic little hug and an
energetic little kiss, I went out and stopped the spinning nuisance
immediately.

After that the hobby went slower and slower, feebler and feebler. One more
energetic display of my bogus spirit and "the enemy was mine."

Winter came on in its duly-appointed time, bringing with it the usual
quantity of wild ducks and more than the usual degree of severe cold.
Charlie was an inveterate duck-shooter, and with the return of the season
came the return of mud and dirt in my bowls.

I determined to do as mother did. A tin basin made its appearance on the
back gallery, four yards of crash sewed together at the end were made to
revolve over the roller, and by way of forcing the experiment to a
successful issue orders were given that my own pitchers should be filled
only after nightfall.

I was sitting in my bed-room sewing away, in placid unconsciousness of
outside cold and discomfort, when Charlie got home from his first hunt of
the season.

"No water, Lulie?" and the monster took hold of my nice pitcher with a
pair of muddy, half-frozen hands.

"On the gallery, dear, just where mother used to keep it;" and I smiled up
at him angelically.

With a muttered something or other, poor Charlie bounded out to the back
gallery. He came back in a minute, his hands as muddy and cold as ever.

"Look here, Lulie: the water's all frozen in that confounded tin basin out
there."

"I'll have it thawed out for you," I said sweetly, rising as I spoke.

"I say, wifey"--and the great, handsome fellow came close up to me with
his mud and his burs--"do you think it's exactly fair, when a fellow's
been out all the morning shooting ducks for your dinner, to make him stand
out on the gallery such a day as this and scrub the mud off his frozen
hands?"

"That's the way mother did," was all my