ilies."

The warehouses did not pay her very well; neither there was she able
to compete with the smart young seamstresses; she only got a dollar
and a quarter a day, and had to lodge and feed herself; yet she kept
on; it was her lot and living; she looked out at her third-story
window upon the roofs and spires, listened to the fire alarms, heard
the chimes of a Sunday, saw carriages roll by and well-dressed
people moving to and fro, felt the thrill of the daily bustle, and
was, after all, a part of this great, beautiful Boston! Strange
though it seem, Miss Belinda Bree was content.

Content enough to tell charming stories of it, up in the country,
to her niece Bel, when she was questioned by her.

Of her room all to herself, so warm in winter, with a red carpet
(given her by the very Mrs. "Callariper" who could not help a
misgiving, after all, that Miss Bree's vocation had been ended with
that wretched word), and a coal stove, and a big, splendid brindled
gray cat--Bartholomew--lying before it; of her snug little
housekeeping, with kindlings in the closet drawer, and milk-jug out
on the stone window-sill; of the music-mistress who had the room
below, and who came up sometimes and sat an hour with her, and took
her cat when she came away, leaving in return, in her own absences,
her great English ivy with Miss Bree. Of the landlady who lived in
the basement, and asked them all down, now and then, to play a game
of cassino or double cribbage, and eat a Welsh rabbit: of things
outside that younger people did,--the girls at the warerooms and
their friends. Of Peck's cheap concerts, and the Public Library
books to read on holidays and Sundays; of ten-cent trips down the
harbor, to see the surf on Nantasket Beach; of the brilliant streets
and shops; of the Public Garden, the flowers and the pond, the boats
and the bridge; of the great bronze Washington reared up on his
horse against the evening sky; of the deep, quiet old avenues of the
Common; of the balloons and the fireworks on the "Fourth of Julies."

I do not think she did it to entice her; I do not think it occurred
to her that she was putting anything into Bel's head; but when Bel
all at once declared that she meant to go to Boston herself and seek
her fortune,--do machine-work or something,--Aunt Blin felt a sudden
thankful delight, and got a glimpse of a possible cheerfulness
coming to herself that she had never dreamed of. If it was pleasant
to tell over these