ing and washing dishes, it turns out
that she is a very rich girl; or will be. She is an orphan, and her
grandfather, although a farmer, has more than a million dollars (which
sounds tremendous, but wouldn't be as impressive, I suppose, if one did
it in pounds); and when he dies, as he must before long, as he is very
old, Patty will have all his money.

Young people get on his nerves, so Patty lives with the Trowbridges,
who are friends of his, and helps Mrs. Trowbridge with her work. She is
so pretty and has such sweet ways that she might make a success
anywhere, and it struck me as a pity that she should perhaps marry some
young farmer in the neighbourhood, and never know any other life than
this. I remarked something of the sort to Mr. Brett when he told me
about Patty, and he looked suddenly miserable as if what I'd said had
hurt.

"I thought you felt you could be happy among such people as these," he
answered, rather irrelevantly.

Then I fancied that I understood a little, for he seems to think that
_he_ is like the men here, but he isn't a bit, oh, not the least bit in
the world, though he says he was brought up on a farm as a little boy,
before he ran away and went far out West, and that it's only an
"accident of fate" he isn't an Albert or an Elisha. As if he could ever
have been like one of them! I have never known a man as interesting as
he.

Ide really _is_ a sort of servant, but she would go away instantly if
anybody called her that; and she is so afraid someone may think she is
inferior to the others in the house because she is paid wages for her
work, that she does her hair elaborately, wears smarter dresses than
the rest, and puts herself rather forward with strangers so as to
impress them. She wouldn't even like to be called a "help," but says
that she "obliges" Mrs. Trowbridge, and she wouldn't stop long enough
to draw another breath if she were not treated better, if anything,
than Patty.

Even in the East, in very grand houses, I thought some of the servants
were rather offhand and queer, though they did consent to have their
meals in the servants' hall or somewhere, and not sit in the drawing
room. I suppose the reason why they are so different with us, and so
polite and well trained, is because at home they are willing to go on
being servants all their lives, whereas, in America, it's only a phase
in a person's career. You may be a parlour maid one year; the next you
may keep a hotel; and th