us seat a pretty middlin' spell."

"I do wish you wouldn't talk so. You ought to be ashamed to be triflin'
round as you do. Come, now, can't you jest tramp over to Pennel's and
tell Sally I want her?"

"Not I, mother. There ain't but two gals in two miles square here, and I
ain't a-goin' to be the feller to shoo 'em apart. What's the use of
bein' gals, and young, and putty, if they can't get together and talk
about their new gownds and the fellers? That ar's what gals is for."

"I do wish you wouldn't talk in that way before Sally, father, for her
head is full of all sorts of vanity now; and as to Mara, I never did see
a more slack-twisted, flimsy thing than she's grown up to be. Now
Sally's learnt to do something, thanks to me. She can brew, and she can
make bread and cake and pickles, and spin, and cut, and make. But as to
Mara, what does she do? Why, she paints pictur's. Mis' Pennel was
a-showin' on me a blue-jay she painted, and I was a-thinkin' whether she
could brile a bird fit to be eat if she tried; and she don't know the
price of nothin'," continued Mrs. Kittridge, with wasteful profusion of
negatives.

"Well," said the Captain, "the Lord makes some things jist to be looked
at. Their work is to be putty, and that ar's Mara's sphere. It never
seemed to me she was cut out for hard work; but she's got sweet ways and
kind words for everybody, and it's as good as a psalm to look at her."

"And what sort of a wife'll she make, Captain Kittridge?"

"A real sweet, putty one," said the Captain, persistently.

"Well, as to beauty, I'd rather have our Sally any day," said Mrs.
Kittridge; "and she looks strong and hearty, and seems to be good for
use."

"So she is, so she is," said the Captain, with fatherly pride. "Sally's
the very image of her ma at her age--black eyes, black hair, tall and
trim as a spruce-tree, and steps off as if she had springs in her heels.
I tell you, the feller'll have to be spry that catches her. There's two
or three of 'em at it, I see; but Sally won't have nothin' to say to
'em. I hope she won't, yet awhile."

"Sally is a girl that has as good an eddication as money can give,"
said Mrs. Kittridge. "If I'd a-had her advantages at her age, I should
a-been a great deal more'n I am. But we ha'n't spared nothin' for Sally;
and when nothin' would do but Mara must be sent to Miss Plucher's school
over in Portland, why, I sent Sally too--for all she's our seventh
child, and Pennel hasn't but