ch a
scheme again we should act together. I am sure my opinion would be of
great advantage to you in helping you to select some one who should take
up the work of making me happy--'

"'You are perfectly horrid!' I exclaimed; and I stopped his mouth.

"That was the end of the matter; but I never learned to like Margaret
Temple. To be sure, I thought seriously of some things she had said; but
then, people can consider things people say without liking the people
who say them. I pity her husband."

Just then came the summons to luncheon, and this story was not commented
upon.

THIS STORY IS TOLD BY

JOHN GAYTHER

AND IS CALLED

BLACKGUM AG'IN' THUNDER

XI

BLACKGUM AG'IN' THUNDER

John Gayther and the Daughter of the House walked in the garden. The
melons were ripe now, and it was a pleasure to push aside the coarse
leaves and find beneath them the tropical-looking fruit with the pretty
network tracery covering the gray-green rind. The grape-vines, too, were
things of beauty, hanging full of great white, yellow, red, and purple
clusters. The tomatoes gleamed scarlet and purple-red thickly among the
plants. The cabbages had curled themselves up into compact heads that
looked like big folded roses set in an open cluster of leaves. There
were rows of green-leaved turnips, red-leaved beets, and feathery-leaved
carrots. The ears were standing stiff in the corn rows.

In the orchard the peaches were rosy and downy, the plums ready to drop
with lusciousness; ruddy-cheeked pears were crowded on the drooping
branches; the apples, not so plentiful, were taking on the colors that
proclaimed their near fruition; and even the knotty quinces were growing
fair and golden. On the upper terrace the stately, delicate cosmos was
waving in the wind; great beds of low marigolds were flaunting their
rich colors in the bright sunlight; the dahlias lifted into the air,
stiffly and proudly, their great blossoms of varying forms; the
clove-pinks, lowly and delicate in color, gave forth the fragrance of
the springtime which they had held stored up in their tender blossoms;
and the early chrysanthemums were unfolding their plumes.

"I love the late August-time," said John Gayther, as the two sat down to
rest in the summer-house after a long stay in the garden. "I have a
singular feeling, which I hope is not irreverent, that the