hat such a false standard of art might do in a
community: that it might even pervert the morals.

"I guess if we don't have anything to hurt our morals any worse than
our coffin-plates, we shall do," returned Flora. She said afterward
that she felt just like digging up some of her own coffin-plates,
and having them framed and hung up, and asking Mrs. Jameson to tea.

All through June and a part of July Louisa and I had seen the
clandestine courtship between Harry Liscom and Harriet Jameson going
on. We could scarcely help it. We kept wondering why neither Caroline
Liscom nor Mrs. Jameson seemed aware of it. Of course, Mrs. Jameson
was so occupied with the village welfare that it might account for it
in her case, but we were surprised that Caroline was so blinded. We
both of us thought that she would be very much averse to the match,
from her well-known opinion of the Jamesons; and it proved that
she was. Everybody talked so much about Harry and his courtship of
Harriet that it seemed incredible that Caroline should not hear of
it, even if she did not see anything herself to awaken suspicion. We
did not take into consideration the fact that a strong-minded woman
like Caroline Liscom has difficulty in believing anything which she
does not wish to be true, and that her will stands in her own way.

However, on Wednesday of the second week of July both she and Mrs.
Jameson had their eyes opened perforce. It was a beautiful moonlight
evening, and Louisa and I were sitting at the windows looking out and
chatting peacefully. Little Alice had gone to bed, and we had not
lit the lamp, it was so pleasant in the moonlight. Presently, about
half-past eight o'clock, two figures strolled by, and we knew who
they were.

"It is strange to me that Grandma Cobb does not find it out, if Mrs.
Jameson is too wrapped up in her own affairs and with grafting ours
into them," said Louisa thoughtfully.

I remarked that I should not be surprised if she did know; and it
turned out afterward that it was so. Grandma Cobb had known all the
time, and Harriet had gone through her room to get to the back
stairs, down which she stole to meet Harry.

The young couple had not been long past when a stout, tall figure
went hurriedly by with an angry flirt of skirts--short ones.

"Oh, dear, that is Mrs. Jameson!" cried Louisa.

We waited breathless. Harry and Harriet could have gone no farther
than the grove, for in a very short time back they all cam