sremember part of the direction
sometimes. And it's wonderful, as I've said many a time before, what you
can send through the mails nowadays. But now tell me about those poor
little orphans in the poultry-yard."

The success of the last hatch was described to her; in fact, all the
news of Brenton was asked for and received, and in turn bits of
Wayborough gossip were told to the attentive Mrs. Franklin, while
Silas's latest sayings were repeated and commented upon.

When Jack and Cynthia had gone out-doors, Miss Betsey drew her chair a
little closer to that of Mrs. Franklin.

"My dear--Hester, I think your name is, and Hester it will be my
pleasure to call you--my dear Hester, I want to tell you first and
foremost that I'm real pleased you should come and be a mother to those
children of Nephew John's. They needed you; they needed you badly. And
now I'm going to treat you as one of the family, and talk over a little
matter with you and John. You've probably heard of Silas Green. He's
been courting me these forty years, and now he's got it into his head
that he can't be climbing this hill any more of a Sunday night. He wants
me to fix the day! I declare, it kind of takes the stiffening right out
of me to think of fixing the day after all these years, and I still hold
out, as I can't give up my view of the river."

"What are you going to do about it, Aunt Betsey?"

"That's just it, John. Well, I'm going to hold out a little longer, and
I think--in fact, I'm pretty sure--that Silas is weakening. You see,
it's kind of lonesome for him down there, now his sister's dead that
kept house for him, and it _is_ depressing to have nothing much to look
at but the Common and the Soldiers' Monument. Yes, I think he's
weakening, and I shouldn't wonder if you were to find him here next time
you come. But I'll let you know in time to come to the wedding, you may
be sure of that. But there's something else I want to speak about."

Here Miss Betsey paused. She folded her hands anew in her lap, and,
rocking briskly, waited for some one to speak. The clock on the
chimney-shelf ticked comfortably, and Miss Trinkett's canary chirped and
hopped about in its cage at the window. Mrs. Franklin looked at her
husband.

"And what is that, Aunt Betsey?" said he. "Somehow you have so taken my
breath away by hinting that you are going to make Mr. Silas Green happy,
after all these years, that I can't take in anything else."

"Ah, now, my dear bo