hou Thy servant depart in peace," and
expired within the hour.

* * * * *

Nineteen summers and winters had passed since Pitt Packard drove "her
that was Jennie Perkins" to Portland on her wedding-trip. He had been
a good and loyal husband; she had been a good and faithful wife; and
never once in the nineteen years had they so much as touched the hem
of the garment of happiness.

Huldah the Prophetess lived on in the old house alone. Time would have
gone slowly and drearily enough had it not been for her ruling
passion. If the first part of the week were fair, she was hopeful that
there was greater chance of rain or snow by Saturday; if it were
rainy, she hoped there would be a long storm. She kept an elaborate
table showing the weather on every day of the year. Fair Saturdays
were printed in red ink, foul Saturdays in jet-black. The last days of
December were generally spent in preparing a succinct statement from
these daily entries. Then in the month of January a neat document,
presenting facts and figures, but no word of personal comment or
communication, was addressed at first to Mr. W. P. Packard, and of
late years to W. Pitt Fessenden Packard, and sent to Goshen, Indiana.

Mr. Packard was a good and loyal husband, as I have said, but there
was certainly no disloyalty in the annual perusal of statistical
weather tables. That these tables, though made out by one of the
weaker sex, were accurate and authentic, he had reason to believe,
because he kept a rigid account of the weather himself, and compared
Huldah's yearly record with his own. The weather in Pleasant River did
not, it is true, agree absolutely with the weather in Goshen, but the
similarity between Maine and Indiana Saturdays was remarkable. The
first five years of Pitt's married life Huldah had the advantage, and
the perusal of her tables afforded Pitt little satisfaction, since it
proved that her superstitions had some apparent basis of reason. The
next five years his turn came, and the fair Saturdays predominated. He
was not any happier, however, on the whole, because, although he had
the pleasure of being right himself, he lost the pleasure of believing
Huldah right. So time went on until Mrs. Pitt died, and was buried
under the handsomest granite monument that could be purchased by the
sale of pumps. Not only were the funeral arrangements carried out with
the liveliest consideration for the departed, but