:

"Oh, Pierre! this reminds me of those stories you used to tell me, of
how you and all your earthly treasures used to hide under this blanket
from the rain!"

The remark afforded an opportunity for a very graceful reply, but four
hours elapsed before I saw it. Sophronia did not seem hurt by my
negligence, but almost instantly continued:

"It would be just like war, if there was only some shooting going on.
Can't you fire your revolver out of the window, Pierre?"

"I could," I replied, "if that blue-eyed agent was anywhere within
range."

"Why, Pierre, I think you're dreadfully unjust to that poor man. _He_
can't go sleeping around in all the rooms of each of his cottages every
time there's a rainstorm, to see if they leak. Besides--oh, Pierre! I've
a brilliant idea! It can't be wet down-stairs."

True. I was so engrossed by different plans of revenge, that I had not
thought of going into the parlor or dining-room to sleep. We moved to
the parlor; Sophronia took the lounge, while I found the floor a little
harder than I supposed an ex-soldier could ever find any plane surface.
It did not take me long, however, to learn that the parlor-floor was
_not_ a plane surface. It contained a great many small elevations which
kept me awake for the remainder of the night, wondering what they could
be. At early dawn I was as far from a satisfactory theory as ever, and I
hastily loosened one end of the carpet and looked under. The
protuberances were knots in the flooring boards. In the days when the
sturdy patriots of New Jersey despised such monarchical luxuries as
carpets, the soft portions of these boards had been slowly worn away,
but the knots--every one has heard the expression "as tough as a pine
knot." Fortunately, we had indulged in a frightfully expensive rug, and
upon this I sought and found a brief period of repose and forgetfulness.

While we were at the breakfast-table our girl appeared, with red eyes
and a hoarse voice, and remarked that now she _must_ leave; she had
learned to like us, and she loved the country, but she had an aged
parent whose sole support she was, and could not afford to risk her life
in such a house.

"Let her go," said Sophronia. "If variety is the spice of life, why
shouldn't the rule apply to servants?"

"Perhaps it does, my dear," I replied; "but if we have to pay each girl
a month's wages for two or three days of work, the spice will be more
costly than enjoyable--eh?"

Immediate