e, and then sat down at the melodeon, while she was waiting, and
sang a hymn; for she was of a musical turn, and was one of the choir.
Then she jumped up and took out the steaming oysters, and they all sat
down.

"Well, well, well!" said her father; "these be good! I did n't s'pose
you hed any very good oysters in your bed, Ephraim. But there, now--I
don't s'pose I ought to have said that; that was n't very polite;
but what I meant was, I did n't s'pose you hed any that was _real_
good--though I don' know but I 've said about the same thing, now. Well,
any way, these be splendid; they 're full as good as those co-hogs we
had t'other night."

"Quahaugs!" said Susan. "The idea of comparing these oysters with
quahaugs!"

"Well, well! that's so!" said her father. "I did n't say right, did I,
when I said that! Of course, there ain't no comparison--that
is--_no_ comparison? Why, of course, they is a comparison between
everything,--but then, cohogs don't really compare with oysters! That's
true!"

And then he paused to eat a few.

He was silent so long at this occupation that they all laughed.

"Well, well!" he said, laying down his fork, and smiling innocently;
"what be you all laughin' at? Not but what I allers like to hev folks
laugh--but then, I did n't see nothin' to laugh at. Still, perhaps they
was suthin' to laugh at that I didn't see; sometimes one man 'll be
lookin' down into his plate, all taken up with his victuals, and others,
that's lookin' around the room, may see the kittens frolickin', or some
such thing. 'T ain't the fust time I 've known all hands to laugh all to
once-t, when I didn't see nothin'."

Susan helped him again, and secured another brief respite.

"Ephraim," said he, after a while, "you ain't skilled to cook oysters
like this, I don't believe. You ought to git married! I was sayin' to
Susan t'other day--well, now, mother, hev I said anything out o' the
way? Well, I don't s'pose 't was just _my_ place to have said anything
about gitt'n' married, to Ephraim, seein's--"

"Come, come, father," said Aunt Lyddy, "that'll do, now. You must let
Ephraim alone, and not joke him about such things."

Meanwhile Susan had hastily gone into the pantry to look for a pie,
which she seemed unable at once to find.

"Pie got adrift?" called out Joshua. "Seems to me you don't hook on to
it very quick. Now that looks good," he added, when she came out.

"That looks like cookin'! All I meant was, 't Ephra