e.

"I have been here this ever-so-long," says the Countess, "gossiping with
cousin Theo, while you have been away at the coffee-house, I dare say,
making merry with your friends, and drinking your punch and coffee.
Guess she must find it rather lonely here, with nothing to do but work
them little caps and hem them frocks. Never mind, dear; reckon you'll
soon have a companion who will amuse you when cousin George is away at
his coffee-house! What a nice lodging you have got here, I do declare!
Our new house which we have took is twenty times as big, and covered
with gold from top to bottom; but I like this quite as well. Bless you
being rich is no better than being poor. When we lived to Albany, and
I did most all the work myself, scoured the rooms, biled the kettle,
helped the wash, and all, I was just as happy as I am now. We only
had one old negro to keep the store. Why don't you sell Gumbo, cousin
George? He ain't no use here idling and dawdling about, and making love
to the servant-girl. Fogh! guess they ain't particular, these English
people!" So she talked, rattling on with perfect good-humour, until her
hour for departure came; when she produced a fine repeating watch, and
said it was time for her to pay a call upon her Majesty at Buckingham
House. "And mind you come to us, George," says her ladyship, waving a
little parting hand out of the gilt coach. "Theo and I have settled all
about it."

"Here, at least," said I, when the laced footmen had clambered up behind
the carriage, and our magnificent little patroness had left us;--"here
is one who is not afraid of our poverty, nor ashamed to remember her
own."

"Ashamed!" said Theo, resuming her lilliputian needlework. "To do her
justice, she would make herself at home in any kitchen or palace in the
world. She has given me and Molly twenty lessons in housekeeping. She
says, when she was at home to Albany, she roasted, baked, swept the
house, and milked the cow." (Madam Theo pronounced the word cow
archly in our American way, and imitated her ladyship's accent very
divertingly.)

"And she has no pride," I added. "It was good-natured of her to ask us
to dine with her and my lord. When will Uncle Warrington ever think of
offering us a crust again, or a glass of his famous beer?"

"Yes, it was not ill-natured to invite us," says Theo, slily. "But,
my dear, you don't know all the conditions!" And then my wife, still
imitating the Countess's manner, laughingly inf