ontributed to my escape. I have often
wondered whether that smile on the face of grandmother did not remind
him, of some of his own boyish pranks.

We boys knew, somehow, what she expected of us, and her expectation
was the measuring rod with which we tested our conduct. Boy-like, we
often wandered away into a far country, but when we returned, she had
the fatted calf ready for us, with never a question as to our travels
abroad. In that way foreign travel lost something of its glamour,
and the home life made a stronger appeal. She made her own bill of
fare so appetizing that we lost all our relish for husks and the
table companions connected with them. She never asked how or where
we acquired the cherry-stains on our shirts, but we knew that she
recognized cherry-stains when she saw them. The next day our shirts
were innocent of foreign cherry-stains, and we experienced a feeling
of righteousness. She made us feel that we were equal partners with
her in the enterprise of life, and that hoeing the garden and eating
the cookies were our part of the compact.

When we went to stay with her for a week or two we carried with us a
book or so of the lurid sort, but returned home leaving them behind,
generally in the form of ashes. She found the book, of course,
beneath the pillow, and replaced it when she made the bed, but never
mentioned the matter to us. Then, in the afternoon, while we munched
cookies she would read to us from some book that made our own book
seem tame and unprofitable. She never completed the story, however,
but left the book on the table where we could find it easily. No
need to tell that we finished the story, without help, in the
evening, and the next day cremated the other book, having found
something more to our liking. One evening, as we sat together, she
said she wished she knew the name of Jephthah's daughter, and then
went on with her knitting as if she had forgotten her wish. At that
age we boys were not specially interested in daughters, no matter
whose they were; but that challenge to our curiosity was too much for
us, and before we went to bed we knew all that is known of that fine
girl.

That was the beginning of our intimate, personal knowledge of Bible
characters--Ruth, Esther, David, and the rest; but grandmother made
us feel that we had known about them all along. I know, even yet,
just how tall Ruth was, and what was the color of her eyes and hair;
and Esther is the stan