it was many a week before he was strong enough to be married. As soon
as he was able to be up and walk around a little he begun to talk
about marryin', and they said old lady Sanford took a lookin'-glass
down from the wall and held it up before him and says she, 'Son, look
at yourself. Do you think you can make a bridegroom out of a
skeleton?' And says she, 'Son, there's jest two people in the world
that wouldn't run from you if they saw you now, and one of 'em's your
mother and the other's the undertaker.' Says she, 'Wait till you look
like a human bein', and then it'll be time to set the weddin' day and
bake the weddin' cake.'

[Illustration: "'ONE MORNING SHE CONCLUDED SHE'D STRAIGHTEN OUT
HENRY'S TRUNK.'"
_Page 148._]

"Well, finally, along in the fall, they got married, and settled down
to housekeepin' as happy as you please. Emmeline was a mighty neat,
orderly sort of a gyirl, and she went to work puttin' things to rights
and makin' the house look homelike, and one mornin' she concluded
she'd straighten out Henry's trunk. I've heard her tell about it many
a time. She said Henry had his outside clothes all mixed up and his
neckties and his socks scattered around all through the trunk, and she
was foldin' things and stackin' 'em up together and singin' 'Flow
Gently, Sweet Afton,' and all at once she come across a little silk
shirt. She said for a minute or so she couldn't take it in, and when
she did, she dropped the shirt like it had been a rattlesnake, and she
got so weak and faint she had to sit down on the side o' the bed. She
said she didn't know how long she set there lookin' at the shirt and
thinkin' terrible things about Henry and makin' up her mind what she'd
say and do, when Henry come in from the field. She said she knew she
ought to be cookin' dinner, and she went down in the kitchen and tried
to, but to save her life she couldn't, her hands trembled so, and she
couldn't keep her mind on what she was tryin' to do. So she went back
up-stairs and set down by the trunk and waited. And when Henry come in
and didn't see her in the kitchen and no signs of dinner anywhere, he
come runnin' up-stairs to find her and started to put his arms around
her and kiss her, but she pushed him off with both hands. And says he,
'Why, Emmeline, what on earth's the matter?' And she said she tried to
answer him, but her voice wouldn't come, and she jest p'inted to the
shirt lyin' on the floor.

"At first Henry