n the girls, and, if you please, I believe I prefer the Western ones."

Allie flushed rosy red at the unexpected compliment, but before she had
time to enjoy it, or to reply, there came a sudden knock at the
dining-room door, and Janey's black face peered in at the crack.

"Miss Allie, honey," she said in a wheedling tone, as she rolled up her
great eyes at her little mistress, "cyarn you get time to write a letter
for me, bymeby?"

"I'll come out as soon as Mr. Howard gets home, Janey," she answered;
then, as the head vanished and the door closed, she added to her cousin,
"Janey can't read nor write, so I have to do all her letters for her.
She's engaged to marry a man in Washington, and she says he's 'in de
guv'ment.' His name is Hamilton Lincoln Cornwallis; but he lives at
number seven and a half Goat Alley, so I don't believe he's President
yet. You've no idea how funny his letters are. Maybe she'll get you to
read one, some day."

CHAPTER III.

THE EVERETT HOUSEHOLD.

Mrs. Euphemia Pennypoker belonged to that unpleasant type of individuals
whose members, for lack of specific excellence, are commonly spoken of
by their friends as "thoroughly estimable women." She possessed all the
virtues, but none of the graces which make virtue attractive to the
youthful mind; and she regulated her daily life by a cast-iron code that
was as unvarying and heartless as the smile which sixty years of habit
had stamped upon her thin, bloodless lips. Mrs. Pennypoker was said to
have been handsome in her day, handsome with an austere, cold beauty;
but her day was long past, and the only remaining trace of her good
looks lay in her piercing gray eyes, and her long, straight Greek nose.
The eyes were undimmed by time; but the crow's-feet had gathered thick
about them, and the Greek nose was surmounted by a pair of large, round
eye-glasses, which only served to intensify the sternness of the eyes
behind them. To the children around her, there was something
awe-inspiring in those eye-glasses, and in the broad black ribbon which
held them suspended about her neck. In times of peace, they had the
appearance of being on the watch for some hidden sin; but when occasion
for punishment arose, there was something positively terrifying in their
glare, and the culprit longed for his last hour to come, that he might
escape from their power.

Dame Nature had been in a generous mood when she had endowed Mrs.
Pennypoker, for she had give