on bein' pinched; why, she
says she give up belts an' took to carpet slippers just for the very
reason as she could _not_ stand bein' pinched nowhere.

"Well, seems as the shoes was Kulosis shoes an' Mrs. Macy says how any
one could remember 'em off of paper _she_ can't see anyhow, an' Luther
Stott's wife lives 2164 Eleventh Avenue S.W., an' that was very
important too, for there's seven other Eleventh Avenues in the city
besides eight Eleventh Streets; seems as the new part of the city is
laid out that way so as to make it simple to them as knows where they
live anyhow.

"Well, Mrs. Macy says she put on her bonnet as happy as any one looks to
be afore they know they're goin' to be the first to have a new invention
tried on 'em an' then she locked up her house an' set off. She says she
never was great on new inventions for she's lived under a lightnin' rod
for pretty near forty years an' never come anywhere nigh to be struck
once yet, but she says she has now learned to her sorrow as bein' fooled
by a lightnin' rod man forty years ago ain't nothin' to bein' fooled by
a minister for forty years ahead, for she says she'll lose her guess if
this last foolin' don't last forty years or even longer if she lives
that long, an' make her wear her felt slippers all the forty years too.

"Well, she says of course you might know as it would be the minister as
done her up first on this day of misery, an' it _was_ the minister! She
says after that donation party to fix him out with new shirts last week
she surely looked to be spared any further inflictions from him for one
while; she says the idea as the congregation is expected to shirt the
minister was surely most new to her, an' she was dead set against it at
first, but she says she come to the fore an' was one to help make him
the six when she see as it was expected to be her duty as a Christian,
but she says she surely hoped when she hemmed the tail of the last one
as she'd seen the last of him for a good breathin' spell.

"But no, Mrs. Lathrop, seems it was n't to be, an' so she learned to her
keen an' pinchin' sorrow yesterday mornin', for she was n't more 'n
fairly on her way to town when she run square up to him on the bridge
an' as a result was just in time to be the first for him to try his new
memory system on, an' she told Gran'ma Mullins an' me with tears in her
eyes an' her felt slippers solemnly crossed on top of each other, as
she can not see why it had to be her