a marble, set in a base of polished Scotch
granite, and the inscription is--Girls!" cried Aunt Pen, rising and
clasping her knees with unexpected energy, "I expressly forbid my age
being printed in the paper, or on the lid, or on the stone! I won't
gratify every gossip in town, that I won't! I shall take real pleasure
in baffling their curiosity. And another thing, while I am about it,
don't you ask Tom Maltby to my funeral, or let him come in, if he comes
himself, on any account whatever. I should rise in my shroud if he
approached me. Yes, I should! Tom Maltby may be all very well; I dare
say he is; and I hope I die at peace with him and all mankind, as a good
Christian should. I forgive him; yes, certainly, I forgive him; but it
doesn't follow that I need forget him; and, so long as I remember him,
the way he conducted in buying the pew over my head I can't get over,
dead or alive. And if I only do get well we shall have a reckoning that
will make his hair stand on end--that he may rely on!" And here Aunt Pen
took the fan from Maria, and moved it actively, till she remembered
herself, when she resigned it. "One thing more," she said. "Whatever
happens, Helen, don't let me be kept over Sunday. There'll certainly be
another death in the family within the year if you do. If I die on
Saturday, there's no help for it. Common decency won't let you shove me
into the ground at once, and so you will have to make up your minds for
a second summons." And Aunt Pen, contemplating the suttee of some one of
us with great philosophy, lay down and closed her eyes again. "You might
have it by torchlight on Sunday night, though," said she, half opening
them. "That would be very pretty." And then she dropped off to sleep
with such a satisfied expression of countenance that we judged her to be
welcoming in imagination the guests at her last rites herself.

Whatever the dream was, she was rudely roused from it by the wreched
little Israel, who came bounding up the stairs, and, without word or
warning, burst into the room, almost white with horror. Why Israel was
afraid I can't conjecture, but, at any rate, a permanent fright would
have been of great personal advantage to him. "Oh, ma'am! oh, miss!
dere's a pusson down stairs, a cullud woman, wid der small-pox!" he
almost whistled in his alarm.

"With the small-pox!" cried Aunt Pen, springing into the middle of the
floor, regardless of her late repose _in articulo mortis_. "Go away,
Israe