t in me--plenty of sperit," chirped grandfather, alert
as an aged sparrow that still contrives to hop stiffly in the sunshine.

"Oh, yes, he's sperit left in him, though he's three years older than
I am," remarked grandmother, with bitterness. "_He_ ain't wo' out with
work and with child bearin' befo' he was ninety. _He_ ain't bald,
_he_ ain't toothless," she concluded passionately, as if each of
grandfather's blessings were an additional insult to her. "He can still
eat hard food when he wants it."

"For pity's sake, be quiet, ma," commanded Sarah sternly, at which the
old woman broke into sobs.

"Yes, I must be quiet, but _he_ can still talk," she moaned.

"Tell me about it, Archie," said Abel, drawing off his overcoat and
sitting down to his supper. "I passed Jonathan Gay in the road and he
asked me to bind up his horse's sprain."

"He'd be damned befo' I'd bind up a sprain for him!" burst out Archie,
with violence. "Met me with a string of partridges this morning and
jumped on me, blast him, as if he'd caught me in the act of stealing.
I'd like to know if we hadn't hunted on that land before he or his
rotten old uncle were ever thought of?"

"Ah, those were merry days, those were!" piped grandfather. "Used to go
huntin' myself when I was young, with Mr. Jordan, an' brought home any
day as many fine birds as I could carry. Trained his dogs for him, too."

"Thar was al'ays time for him to go huntin'," whimpered grandmother.

"What are you goin' to do about it, Abel?" asked Sarah, turning upon him
with the smoking skillet in her hand.

At the question Blossom Revercomb, who was seated at work under the
lamp, raised her head and waited with an anxious, expectant look for the
answer. She was embroidering a pair of velvet slippers for Mr. Mullen--a
task begun with passion and now ending with weariness. While she
listened for Abel's response, her long embroidery needle remained
suspended over the toe of the slipper, where it gleamed in the lamp
light.

"I don't know," replied Abel, and Blossom drew a repressed sigh of
relief; "I've just ordered him to keep clear of our land, if that's what
you're hintin' at."

"If you had the sperit of yo' grandpa you'd have knocked him down in the
road," said Sarah angrily.

"Yes, yes, I'd have knocked him down in the road," chimed in the old
man, with the eagerness of a child.

"You can't knock a man down when he asks to borrow your lantern,"
returned Abel, doggedly, on t