old cap'n was, but he
used to entertain real handsome. I rec'lect one night they was a playin'
after the wine was brought in, and he upset his glass all over Miss
Martha Lorimer's invisible-green watered silk, and spoilt the better
part of two breadths. She sent right over for me early the next morning
to see if I knew of anything to take out the spots, but I didn't, though
I can take grease out o' most any material. We tried clear alcohol, and
saleratus-water, and hartshorn, and pouring water through, and heating
of it, and when we got through it was worse than when we started. She
felt dreadful bad about it, and at last she says, 'Judith, we won't work
over it any more, but if you 'll give me a day some time or 'nother,
we'll rip it up and make a quilt of it.' I see that quilt last time I
was in Miss Rebecca's north chamber. Miss Martha was her aunt; you never
saw her; she was dead and gone before your day. It was a silk old Cap'n
Peter Lorimer, her brother, who left 'em his money, brought home from
sea, and she had worn it for best and second best eleven year. It looked
as good as new, and she never would have ripped it up if she could have
matched it. I said it seemed to be a shame, but it was a curi's figure.
Cap'n Manning fetched her one to pay for it the next time he went to
Boston. She didn't want to take it, but he wouldn't take no for an
answer; he was free-handed, the cap'n was. I helped 'em make it 'long of
Mary Ann Simms the dressmaker,--she's dead and gone too,--the time it
was made. It was brown, and a beautiful-looking piece, but it wore
shiny, and she made a double-gown of it before she died."

Mrs. Patton brought Kate and me some delicious old-fashioned cake with
much spice in it, and told us it was made by old Mrs. Chantrey Brandon's
receipt which she got in England, that it would keep a year, and she
always kept a loaf by her, now that she could afford it; she supposed we
knew Miss Katharine had named her in her will long before she was sick.
"It has put me beyond fear of want," said Mrs. Patton. "I won't deny
that I used to think it would go hard with me when I got so old I
couldn't earn my living. You see I never laid up but a little, and it's
hard for a woman who comes of respectable folks to be a pauper in her
last days; but your aunt, Miss Kate, she thought of it too, and I'm sure
I'm thankful to be so comfortable, and to stay in my house, which I
couldn't have done, like's not. Miss Rebecca Lor