d rallying from
her grief at parting with her child, she plunged at once into
repairs, tearing down and building up, while her husband looked on
in dismay. When they were about it, she said, they might as well
have all the modern improvements, and water, both hot and cold, was
accordingly carried to all the sleeping apartments, the fountain-head
being a large spring distant from the house nearly half a mile.
Gas she could not have, though the doctor would hardly have been
surprised had she ordered the laying of pipes from Rochester to
Laurel Hill, so utterly reckless did she seem. She was fond of
company, and as she had visited everybody, so everybody in return
must visit her, she said, and toward the last of summer she filled
the house with city people, who vastly enjoyed the good cheer with
which her table was always spread.

John's desire to see the fun was more than satisfied, as was also
Hannah's, and after the receipt of Maude's letter the latter
determined to write herself, "and let Miss De Vere know just how
things was managed." In order to do this, it was necessary to employ
an amanuensis, and she enlisted the services of the gardener, who
wrote her exact language, a mixture of negro, Southern, and Yankee.
A portion of this letter we give to the reader.

After expressing her pleasure that Maude could see, and saying that
she believed the new Miss to be a good woman, but a mighty queer
one, she continued:

"The doin's here is wonderful, and you'd hardly know the old place.
Thar's a big dining room run out to the south, with an expansion
table mighty nigh a rod long, and what's more, it't allus full too,
of city stuck-ups--and the way they do eat! I haint churned nary
pound of butter since you went away. Why, bless yer soul, we has to
buy. Do you mind that patch of land what the doctor used to plant
with corn? Well, the garden sass grows there now, and t'other garden
raises nothin' but flowers and strabries, and thar's a man hired on
purpose to tend 'em. He's writin' this for me. Thar's a tower run up
in the northeast eend, and when it's complete, she's goin' to have a
what you call 'em--somethin' that blows up the water--oh, a
fountain. Thar's one in the yard, and, if you'll believe it, she's
got one of Cary's rotary pumpin' things, that folks are runnin'
crazy about, and every hot day she keeps John a-turnin' the injin'
to squirt the water all over the yard, and make it seem like a
thunder shower! Thar's a