roposed that I
should accept of him for my husband then and there."

"And pray, what did you say to _him_!"

"I told him that I did not know what use I had for him, unless I should
put him behind the stove, and break bark over his head."

This reply tickled my fancy so much that I laughed until I cried. I
insisted on knowing what put it into her mind to say that.

"You see, we burned fir wood, the bark of which is better to make heat
than the woody portion of the tree; but is never sawed or split, and has
to be broken. I used to take up a big piece, and bring it down with a
blow over any sharp corner to knock it into smaller fragments, and
something in the man's appearance, I suppose, suggested that he might be
good for that, if for nothing else. I did not stop to frame my replies
on any forms laid down in young ladies' manuals; but they seemed to be
conclusive as a general thing."

"I should think so. Yet, there must have been some, more nearly your
equals, attracted by your youth and beauty, loving you, or capable of
loving you, to whom you could not give such answers, by whom such
answers would not be taken."

"As I look back upon it now, I cannot think of any one I might have
taken and did not, that I regret. There were men of all classes nearly;
but they were not desirable, as I saw it then, or as I see it now. It is
true that I was young, and pretty, perhaps, and that women were in a
minority. But then, too, the men who were floating about on the surface
of pioneer society were not likely to be the kind of men that make true
lovers and good husbands. Some of them have settled down into
steady-going benedicts, and have money and position. The worst effect of
all this talk about marrying was, that it prepared me to be persuaded
against my inner consciousness into doing that which I ought not to have
done. My truer judgment had become confused, my perceptions clouded,
from being so often assailed by the united majority who could not bear
to see poor, little minority go unappropriated. But come, let us have
our cakes and lemonade. You need something to sustain you while I
complete the recital of my conquests."

I felt that she needed a brief interval in which to collect her thoughts
and calm a growing nervousness that in spite of her efforts at
pleasantry would assert itself in various little ways, evident enough to
my observation. A saucepan of water was set upon the hot coals on the
hearth, the lemons cut an