handsome. Now, if you were an ugly
old girl, or I was certain of you, I shouldn't feel so bad, nor act so
neither. But when there's a lot of hungry chaps round, all gaping to
gobble you up, and even poor little Snipes trying to peck and bite at
you, and you won't say 'yes' nor 'no' to me, how do you expect a man to
keep cool? Can't do it, nohow, and you needn't ask it. Human nature's
human nature, I suppose, and mine ain't a quiet nor a patient one, not
by no manner of means. Come, Sallie, own up; you wouldn't like me so
well as I hope you do if it was,--now, would you?"

Mrs. Franklin smiled, though she had heard not a word of the lovers'
quarrel, as she put a pin in the back of the ruffled collar which Sallie
had come to reclaim. A quarrel it had evidently been, and as evidently
the lady was mollified, for she said, "Don't be absurd, Jim!" and Jim
laughed and responded, "All right, Sallie, you're an angel! But come, we
must hurry, or the curtain'll be up,"--and away went the dashing and
handsome couple.

Abram, shutting in the shutters, and fastening the door, sat down to a
quiet evening's reading, while his mother knitted and sewed,--an evening
the likeness of a thousand others of which they never tired; for this
mother and son, to whom fate had dealt so hard a measure, upon whom the
world had so persistently frowned, were more to each other than most
mothers and sons whose lines had fallen in pleasanter
places,--compensation, as Mr. Emerson says, being the law of existence
the world over.

CHAPTER III

"_Every one has his day, from which he dates._"

OLD PROVERB

You see, Surrey, the school is something extra, and the performances,
and it will please Clara no end; so I thought I'd run over, and
inveigled you into going along for fear it should be stupid, and I would
need some recreation."

"Which I am to afford?"

"Verily."

"As clown or grindstone?--to make laugh, or sharpen your wits upon?"

"Far be it from me to dictate. Whichever suits our character best. On
the whole, I think the last would be the most appropriate; the first I
can swear wouldn't!"

"_Pourquoi_?"

"O, a woman's reason,--because!"

"Because why? Am I cross?"

"Not exactly."

"Rough?"

"As usual,--like a May breeze."

"Cynical?"

"As Epicurus."

"Irritable?"

"'A countenance [and manner] more in sorrow than in anger.' Something's
wrong with you; who is she?"

"She!"

"Ay,--she. That was a wise Eastern