not so pious-mouthed as some, but he had charity in his soul,
which is more than some others has."

She swept a superbly disdainful look toward the Rev. McCaleb. The
recording secretary tapped reprovingly with her pencil, but the
president only listened.

"Now, ma'am, we ain't paupers, we old folks. Every one of us, as you
know, has paid our thousand dollars in. An' we ain't bad children as
needs disciplinin'; an' they's no use treatin' grandmothers an'
great-grandmothers as though they was. It's in me to love birds, an' no
'mount of rules and regulations is goin' to change me. My canary bird
died the same year Cap'n Walker saved every other soul on board his
ship and went down alone to the bottom with her. Since then I've sort o'
adopted the sparrers. Why, haven't I spent every afternoon through the
summer out in the park a-feedin' them my lunch? An' now that winter's
come, d'ye think I'd have the face to desert them?

"'Not one of them is forgotten before God'--do you remember, ma'am? One
of 'em seemed to be in the early winter. It was before my rheumatism got
so bad. I was out in the park the afternoon the first snow fell, an'
this poor little crittur with a wing broke kep' a trailin' an' chirpin'
an' scuttlin' in front o' me. It'd fell out o' the nest; hardly covered
with feathers, it was. I picked it up an' carried it to my room in my
apron. Poor little mite--how it fluttered an' struggled! I kep' it
overnight in my spool-box. In the mornin' I fed it; by noon the sun come
out, an' I let it out on the window-sill, where I keep my house plants;
just a bit o' musk--the cap'n liked musk--an' a pot o' bergamot. Do you
know, ma'am, that little thing was that contented by the end of the week
that I could leave the windows open an' nary a wing's stroke away would
it go? That was in December, 'fore it got to be known that I kep' a bird
in my room. That mild spell we had 'fore Christmas it did fly away one
morning, but at sundown there it was back again; an' when it came on to
snow that night I felt same's I used to 'tween voyages, when I could
hear how the ocean'd get lashed to a fury, an' Cap'n Walker'd be fast
asleep safe beside me.

"Of course it was a pity that when the bird came back it showed others
the way--but wasn't it cute of it, ma'am? An' wasn't it just like a lot
o' children hangin' 'round at maple-syrup time? They did make a clatter
an' a racket in the early mornin' when I wouldn't be up an' they'd be
rea