eks. "Land! he looked elegant! They say
he's only six feet, but he might 'a' been sixteen, and he certainly did
make a fine speech."

"Did you notice Rebecca, how white she was, and how she trembled when
she and Herbert Dunn stood there while the governor was praisin' 'em?
He'd read her composition, too, for he wrote the Sawyer girls a letter
about it." This remark was from the sympathetic Mrs. Cobb.

"I thought 't was kind o' foolish, his makin' so much of her when it
wan't her graduation," objected Mrs. Meserve; "layin' his hand on her
head 'n' all that, as if he was a Pope pronouncin' benediction. But
there! I'm glad the prize come to Riverboro 't any rate, and a
han'somer one never was give out from the Wareham platform. I guess
there ain't no end to Adam Ladd's money. The fifty dollars would 'a'
been good enough, but he must needs go and put it into those elegant
purses."

"I set so fur back I couldn't see 'em fairly," complained Delia, "and
now Rebecca has taken hers home to show her mother."

"It was kind of a gold net bag with a chain," said Mrs. Perkins, "and
there was five ten-dollar gold pieces in it. Herbert Dunn's was put in
a fine leather wallet."

"How long is Rebecca goin' to stay at the farm?" asked Delia.

"Till they get over Hannah's bein' married, and get the house to
runnin' without her," answered Mrs. Perkins. "It seems as if Hannah
might 'a' waited a little longer. Aurelia was set against her goin'
away while Rebecca was at school, but she's obstinate as a mule, Hannah
is, and she just took her own way in spite of her mother. She's been
doin' her sewin' for a year; the awfullest coarse cotton cloth she had,
but she's nearly blinded herself with fine stitchin' and rufflin' and
tuckin'. Did you hear about the quilt she made? It's white, and has a
big bunch o' grapes in the centre, quilted by a thimble top. Then
there's a row of circle-borderin' round the grapes, and she done them
the size of a spool. The next border was done with a sherry glass, and
the last with a port glass, an' all outside o' that was solid stitchin'
done in straight rows; she's goin' to exhibit it at the county fair."

"She'd better 'a' been takin' in sewin' and earnin' money, 'stead o'
blindin' her eyes on such foolishness as quilted counterpanes," said
Mrs. Cobb. "The next thing you know that mortgage will be foreclosed on
Mis' Randall, and she and the children won't have a roof over their
heads."

"Don't they say th