"Laws, yes! if missis will go a-tumblin' things all up so, it will.
Missis has spilt lots dat ar way," said Dinah, coming uneasily to the
drawers. "If missis only will go up-sta'rs till my clarin'-up time
comes, I'll have everything right; but I can't do nothin' when ladies is
'round a-henderin'. You Sam, don't you gib de baby dat ar sugar-bowl!
I'll crack ye over, if ye don't mind!"

"I'm going through the kitchen, and going to put everything in order,
_once_, Dinah; and then I'll expect you to _keep_ it so."

"Lor', now, Miss 'Phelia, dat ar ain't no way for ladies to do. I never
did see ladies doin' no sich; my old missis nor Miss Marie never did,
and I don't see no kinder need on't." And Dinah stalked indignantly
about, while Miss Ophelia piled and sorted dishes, emptied dozens of
scattering bowls of sugar into one receptacle, sorted napkins,
table-cloths, and towels, for washing; washing, wiping and arranging
with her own hands, and with a speed and alacrity which perfectly amazed
Dinah.

"Lor', now! if dat ar de way dem Northern ladies do, dey ain't ladies
nohow," she said to some of her satellites, when at a safe
hearing-distance. "I has things as straight as anybody, when my
clarin'-up times comes; but I don't want ladies 'round a-henderin' and
gettin' my things all where I can't find 'em."

To do Dinah justice, she had, at irregular periods, paroxysms of
reformation and arrangement, which she called "clarin'-up times," when
she would begin with great zeal and turn every drawer and closet wrong
side outward on to the floor or tables, and make the ordinary confusion
sevenfold more confounded. Then she would light her pipe and leisurely
go over her arrangements, looking things over and discoursing upon them;
making all the young fry scour most vigorously on the tin things, and
keeping up for several hours a most energetic state of confusion, which
she would explain to the satisfaction of all inquirers by the remark
that she was a "clarin'-up." "She couldn't hev things a-gwine on so as
they had been, and she was gwine to make these yer young ones keep
better order;" for Dinah herself, somehow, indulged the illusion that
she herself was the soul of order, and it was only the _young uns_, and
the everybody else in the house, that were the cause of anything that
fell short of perfection in this respect. When all the tins were
scoured, and the tables scrubbed snowy white, and everything that could
offend tucked