he is she ain't going to send his aunt the Christmas present
that she's got half done for her. But Mat won't say, just keeps
showing his thumb to everybody and talking about silver linings to
every cloud. There's no use talking, some men are aggravating.

"Mandy Jutlins don't know whether to have the telephone put in or not.
She says the Lord knows she has enough children to run all her errands
and take all messages and that the two dollars a month comes in handy
for a new pair of shoes. And if it's in she says more than likely
she'll be wasting her time listening to a lot of silly gossip. Of
course that was a foolish remark for Mandy to make, seeing all her
friends have telephones. Two or three's took it personal and aren't
speaking a word to Mandy but plenty about her. One of them is supposed
to have said that it's a fact that Mandy doesn't need a telephone, that
she talks enough without it, and that in her opinion the worst kind of
a gossip is the kind that stays at home the whole enduring time, never
taking pains to see how things really happen and always knowing
everything.

"Emmy Smith doesn't know what to do with her oldest girl, Eleanor.
Eleanor just won't wash the knives and forks and spoons. She'll scrape
and scald and polish the pots and pans and does the china beautiful,
but she will leave the knives and forks and even hides them away dirty.
Did you ever hear of such a thing? Emmy can't explain it unless it's
due to the shiftless streak in all the Smiths.

"Agnes Hooper's crab-apple jell is about all gone and here it's hardly
cool yet. Those boys of hers just want to live on crab-apple jell and
Aggie says she's got to the end of her strength and patience, that
Charlie'd better pull up and move out among the Mormons where he could
have a couple of more wives to help keep those boys filled up.

"Jennie Burton's sauerkraut isn't going to keep and hasn't turned out
well, she thinks. Fremy Stockton says it's because she forgot to put
in a little mite of sugar and altogether too much salt.

"Grace Cook's husband bought a whole pig from some farmer Bloomingdale
way, thinking it was going to be good and cold by this time. And Grace
has got up at four o'clock every morning for a week and stayed up till
midnight, trying to get that pig out of sight. She's rendered lard and
made sausage and salted and smoked meat till every crock is full.
Yesterday she was making head cheese, sick to her stomach and cry