poetry I did not know then:--

"He prayeth best who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all."

It was so nice that I turned it over in my mind several times before I
asked another question. My mother sometimes called me "an animated
interrogation-point."

"Is Old Madam Leigh married?"

"She has been married. She would not be 'Madam' if she had not been. She
has been a widow for a long, long time. She had two children--twins--a
boy and a girl. They lived to be twenty years old, and then died."

"Not both at the same time, Cousin Molly Belle?" for her tone suggested
something very sorrowful.

"Yes, Molly dear. The sister fell into the river and the brother, in
swimming out to save her, was seized with the cramp and sank before he
could reach her. The mother has lived alone ever since, except for her
servants. They are very good and faithful. Then, she has her hummers and
her pygmies, who are a great deal of company to her."

"_Pigs!_" in intense disgust. "She can't be a very neat person."

A peal of laughter from my companions broke off the speech.

"You'll change your mind shortly," said Cousin Frank, cantering ahead to
open a gate in the rail fence.

We saw the house from the gate,--a wee bit of a gray cottage, one story
high, literally covered with honeysuckles of every kind I had ever heard
of, and now in fullest bloom. An enormous catalpa tree, also in flower,
stood in front of the cottage, shading all but one gable, and that
looked as if it were made of glass. Between this gable and the garden
were two spreading acacia trees, tufted with the tassel-like blossoms.
The deep front porch was curtained with white jessamine, and as we
walked up the gravelled path leading to it, Madam Leigh stood in the
doorway.

She was a tiny old lady, no taller than I was, and wore a white dress,
fine and sheer. Cousin Molly Belle told me afterward that it was India
muslin, and that she wore white, winter and summer. The waist of the
gown was very short, the skirt was straight, and fell to the in-step of
a foot no bigger than a baby's. Her cap was also old-fashioned, made of
lace, with a full crimped border under which her hair, silvery-white,
was dressed in short, round curls on each side of her forehead. Her skin
reminded me of a bit of rice-paper I had picked up from the floor one
day. It had dropped out of the back of my father's watch, and Bud had