ls stoop down to examine the hearth-rug, wondering
"how much it cost when 'twas new."

We left 'Lena standing on the steps of the piazza.

At a glance she had taken in the whole--had comprehended that there
was no affinity whatever between herself and the objects around her,
and a wild, intense longing filled her heart to be once more among
her native hills. She had witnessed the merriment of the blacks, the
scornful curl of Carrie's lip, the half-suppressed ridicule of Anna,
when they met her grandmother, and now uncertain of her own
reception, she stood before her cousins not knowing whether to
advance or run away. For a moment there was an awkward silence, and
then John Jr., bent on mischief, whispered to Carrie, "Look at that
pinch in her bonnet, and just see her shoes! Big as little
sailboats!"

This was too much for Lena. She already disliked John Jr., and now,
flying into a violent passion, she drew off her shoes, and hurling
them at the young gentleman's head fled away, away, she knew not,
cared not whither, so that she got out of sight and hearing. Coming
at last to the arbor bridge across the brook in the garden, she
paused for breath, and throwing herself upon a seat, burst into a
flood of tears. For several minutes she sobbed so loudly that she
did not hear the sound of footsteps upon the graveled walk. Anna had
followed her, partly out of curiosity, and partly out of pity, the
latter of which preponderated when she saw how bitterly her cousin
was weeping. Going up to her she said, "Don t cry so, 'Lena. Look
up and talk. It's Anna, your cousin."

'Lena had not yet recovered from her angry fit, and thinking Anna
only came to tease her, and perhaps again ridicule her bonnet, she
tore the article, from her head, and bending it up double, threw it
into the stream, which carried it down to the fish-pond, where for
two or three hours it furnished amusement for some little negroes,
who, calling it a crab, fished for it with hook and line! For a
moment Anna stood watching the bonnet as it sailed along down the
stream, thinking it looked better there than on its owner's head, but
wondering why 'Lena had thrown it away. Then again addressing her
cousin, she asked why she had done so?

"It's a homely old thing, and I hate it," answered 'Lena, again
bursting into tears. "I hate everybody, and I wish I was dead, or
back in Massachusetts, I don't care which!"

With her impressions of the "Bay State,"