Mason appears
more at home here than in the city. I suppose you know she was a poor
girl when Mr. Mason married her, and such people almost always show
their breeding. Still she is a good sort of a woman, and it is well
enough to have some such nice place to visit and get fruit. Weren't
those delicious berries, and ain't these splendid rosebuds?"

"I guess, though," said Jenny, glancing at her mother's huge bouquet,
"Mrs. Mason didn't expect you to gather quite so many. And Rose, too,
trampled down a beautiful lily without ever apologizing."

"And what if I did?" retorted Rose. "She and that girl have nothing to
do but fix it up."

This allusion to Mary, reminded Mrs. Campbell of her conversation with
Mrs. Mason, and laughingly she repeated it. "I never knew before,"
said she, "that Mrs. Mason had so much spirit. Why, she really seemed
quite angry, and tried hard to make Mary out beautiful, and graceful,
and all that."

"And," chimed in Ella, who was angry at Mrs. Mason for defending her
sister, and angry at her sister for being defended, "don't you think
she said that Mary ought to be ashamed of me."

"Is it possible she was so impudent!" said Mrs. Lincoln; "I wish I
had been present, I would have spoken my mind freely, but so much one
gets for patronizing such creatures."

Here the road became narrow, and as the western sky showed indications
of a storm, the coachmen were told to drive home as soon as possible.

Mrs. Campbell's advice with regard to Mary, made no difference
whatever with Mrs. Mason's plans. She had always intended doing for
her whatever she could, and knowing that a good education was of far
more value than money, she determined to give her every advantage
which lay in her power. There was that summer a most excellent school
in Rice Corner, and as Mrs. Mason had fortunately no prejudices
against a district school, where so many of our best and greatest men
have been educated, she resolved to send her little protege, as soon
as her wardrobe should be in a suitable condition. Accordingly in a
few days Mary became a regular attendant at the old brown
school-house, where for a time we will leave her, and passing silently
over a period of several years, again in another chapter open the
scene in the metropolis of the "Old Bay State."

CHAPTER XV.

THE THREE YOUNG MEN

It was beginning to be daylight in the city of Boston; and as the gray
east gradually brightened and grew red in the c