other end, generally conceded to be luxurious, but silently avoided,
as having given, on more than one occasion, a sharp suggestion of quills.
Over the whole, depressions and excrescences, was stretched a faded
chintz cover. But woe to the luckless wight who thought to find repose
by throwing himself carelessly down on this hitherto untried structure!
It was reserved only to the knowing few to find a comfortable seat on the
lounge.

The cat, without having subjected herself to those trials which some of
us endured, had discovered, with true feline instinct, wherein the
deepest rest lay, and had established herself on a suspended bridge of
chintz between two overhanging systems.

There were a few chairs in the room besides, but the doorsteps were wide.
Grandpa sat always in the south door, Grandma on the steps looking
towards the lane, and it was at this latter inviting spot that the
neighbors, the "passers by," paused most frequently and disposed
themselves, with a grateful air.

I listened to their talk, while the birds struggled to make noisy
interruptions and cast their fleeting shadows in the sunlight on the
floor, and the peach-blossoms outside were falling noiselessly.

Grandma Keeler had been telling me in a happy, droning voice, though
gravely enough, of the "awakenin'" that was going on in Wallencamp--how
"a good many o' the young folks was impressed," and "Cap'n Sartell had
been seekin', ever since little Bessie died, and some that had seemed to
be forgitful and backslidin' had come forward and told where they stood,
until it seemed as though the Lord was a sendin' a blessin' down, jest as
soft and beautiful as them blossoms;" and Grandma's eyes wandered towards
the peach-tree with a tearful fervor in them.

Aunt Patty was a temporary occupant of the steps. Her anxious, care-lined
face was turned indoors, away from the light and the falling blossoms.
There was an anxious, restless ring in her voice, too.

"I'm glad to hev such a time, I'm sure," said she. "We need it bad
enough, any time, Lord knows!--but it seems a queer season o' the year
for't. When we've had 'em before it's generally been along in the winter.
I never heered of an awakenin' before right in the midst o'
tater-buggin'."

Aunt Patty was not intentionally irreverent. Life, with her, had been so
narrow and hard pressed, always a painful reckoning of times and seasons.

The allusion to "tater-buggin'" gave Grandpa an opportunity of a sor