nce
and a clear conscience assured our patient hostess that the dog-days
and her unworthy guests should go out together. Yet we never told a
lie or wilfully deceived any man, much less a woman.

But we anticipate. At the close of the third day we essayed to examine
progress at the new house. As we approached, a dim and doubtful but
wondrous pleasant anticipation took possession of our fancy. What if
it should, indeed, be finished! The carpenter had suggested three or
four days,--three had already passed. The painter was to get through
_almost_ as soon, the plumber would surely be out of the way, and
there would be only the furnace registers. It was, perhaps, too good
to be true, and we lingered to give the notion time to grow. Opening
the door at last, we received something the same shock the traveller
feels when he encounters a guide-post telling him the next town is
half a mile farther on than it was three miles back. But we've not
lived forty years without learning to bury our "might-have-beens" with
outward composure, whatever the internal commotion. We remembered
there was still a week, and resolved to keep a sharp lookout that no
time was wasted; an idle resolution, for the workmen were as anxious
to get through as we were to have them. Faithful industry and
attention we may demand, haste we have no right to ask. But our men
actually hurried. We were instant in season and out of season, and can
testify, with both hands in our empty pockets, that there was not an
hour wasted. Yet our full-blown hopes fell, as the roses fall, leaf by
leaf; drop by drop our patience ebbed, till, ere the close of the
week, we sank slowly down on a pile of black-walnut shavings in the
calmness of despair.

To make a long story short, we gave up, beaten, trespassed a week on
our long-suffering hostess, then went to visit our rich relations.
They were glad to see us when we came, and wondered how long we were
going to stay. We thought best to let them wonder, which they did for
the space of a few weeks, when we folded our nightgowns and silently
stole--not the spoons, but ourselves--away.

We mentioned the calmness of despair. From that depth it is often but
a single step to the serenity of faith, on which sublime height not
the wreck of matter and the crush of worlds hath power to vex or make
afraid, much less a few pine shavings and the want of a little paint.
Despair is never endless; it's a short-lived emotion at the worst, a
sel