Thanksgivin' three days ahead
and had to, for I couldn't help it.

I believe in makin' preparations ahead; I believe in takin' time by
the forelock and leadin' it along peaceable and stiddy by my side,
instead of time's drivin' me, rough shod and pantin' for breath over a
household path, rocky and rough with belated duties. And it wuz three
days before Thanksgivin' I sot in my clean, cheerful-lookin' kitchen
seedin' some raisins for the fruit cake, Josiah bein' out to the barn
killin' two fat pullets for the chicken pie. Ury wuz down in the swamp
gittin' some evergreens and holly berries to decorate with, and
Philury dressin' the turkey and ducks in the back kitchen, when I
heard a rap at the settin' room door and I wiped my hands on the
roller towel and smoothed back my hair and went to the door.

And who do you spoze stood there? His eyes shinin' brighter than the
sky did, though that wuz clear blue, lit by a warm sunshine. It wuz
Ernest White, and guess who wuz by his side; I'll tell you, for you
never could think who it wuz--it wuz Waitstill Webb. I had thought her
face wuz as sweet as it could be in sorrow, but I had never seen it in
gladness before. She looked like a sweet white rose just blowed out
under the warm sun of a perfect June day.

"Ernest White!" sez I, "how glad I am to see you! And Waitstill Webb!
can I believe my eyes?" sez I, "is it you?" And I took both their
hands in mine at one time.

"Waitstill Webb!" sez I agin, "is it you?"

"No," sez Ernest White, "it is Waitstill White."

You could have knocked me down with a hair-pin. I kissed 'em both
smilin' and weepin', laughin' and cryin', we all on us wuz like three
fools, or three wise ones, I d'no which. And that's how I begun to
keep Thanksgivin' more'n three days ahead.

They come right into the kitchen and made me keep on with my work,
which I did after a little, they takin' holt and helpin' me like two
happy children. They stayed most all the forenoon, but had promised to
go back to Arvilly's to dinner.

Well! Well! I hadn't been so tickled in matrimonial ways and riz up
and routed and dumb foundered since Thomas J. and Maggie Snow got
engaged. It seems that Ernest White had gone way out to the
Philippines after her, and they wuz married in a little American
chapel by a missionary of the M. E. meetin'-house.

They wuz goin' right to housekeeping in the widder Pooler's, where
he had boarded. The widder had gone to live with her daughte