is full o'
sympathy for 'em. The Browns was in church themselves to-day, all but
Amelia, an' I had the story from them straight for the first time. Young
Dr. Brown says he can't understand any of it; he says the stuff must be
stirred in a barrel for two hours without stoppin' an' he says he'll let
any man breathe a suspicion as his mother stopped after he once set her
at it! Mrs. Brown says she did n't stop neither, she says when she could
n't move her arms any more for love or money, she stuck the broomstick
through her belt an' sat on the edge o' the barrel an' kept the stuff
stirrin' so. They poured in the acid right after breakfast, an' then Dr.
Brown wanted the test to be thorough, so they put a live fly in each
room, shut the doors between, shut all the windows, took the silver out
on the lawn, an' then threw a match into the barrel an' run out the coal
cellar door.

"Amelia is up at her father's an' ain't able to speak of it yet, but
Mrs. Brown says her own view of it will always be as it was a explosion.
She says as she can't see how you could call it anythin' else in the
world. She says they was all sittin' in the arbor an' Amelia was just
gettin' into the hammock an' Dr. Brown was just beginnin' on the King o'
Spain's honeymoon in the paper, with a picture of a bullfight to
illustrate it, when she heard such a noise as she never will forget
again in all her life to come. She says her first thought was as Amelia
had bu'st the hammock, for she says she tries to be kind to the bosom
wife of her chosen son, but Amelia is surely most awful hard on anythin'
as you get in an' out of, but then she heard the second noise, an' she
says to her dyin' day she won't be able to swear to nothin' but as she
thought it was San Francisco quakin' right in our very middle. Why, she
says, she never for one second doubted as it was a earthquake. The
canary-bird cage come sailin' out o' the dinin'-room window, all the
chimneys went down with a crash, an' Amelia give one yell an' fainted.
Mrs. Brown says she an' young Dr. Brown did n't really know which way to
turn for a minute. They could n't seem to think whether their first duty
was to shake Amelia or run around to the front of the house. The windows
was blowin' out as fast as they could an' the most awful smellin' smoke
you ever smelt was pourin' out after them! She said the smell was bad
enough when she was stirrin' the stuff in the barrel, but exploded, it
was just beyond all be