seventeen and goes to the city to dance.
And Miss Bess' and yours are shoe-tops, too."

"Now you see what it is to raise a child to be led into sin and vanity,"
said Mrs. Addcock, looking at me reproachfully from her seat upon the floor
at the feet of the worldly Mamie.

"I'll turn up the hem just right, Mrs. Addcock, while you get the collars
on little Sammie's and Willie's shirts," I said soothingly as I sank down
beside her at Mamie's feet.

"I had to cut Sammie's shirt with a tail to tuck in, all on account of that
Mr. Matthew Berry's telling him that shirt and pants ought to do business
together. And there's Willie's jeans pants got to have pockets for the
knife that Mr. Owen gave him. I just can't keep up with these city notions
of my children with five of 'em and a weak back." As she grumbled Mrs.
Addcock rose slowly from her lowly position to her feet.

"I'll make Willie's trousers, Mrs. Addcock, this afternoon, if he'll come
and help me feed and bed everything at Elmnest," I offered, with my mouth
full of pins.

"No, child, but thank you for your willing heart. Mrs. Spain told me how
you made Ezra's pants so one leg of him came while the other went, and I
guess a mother is the only one to get the legs of her own offspring to
match. I'll work it out myself now that Miss Mamie is attended to."

"But now I know how to trouser boys normally. I turned Joe Tillett out in
perfect proportion as well as in strong jeans," I answered, without the
least offense at finding my first efforts as a tailor thus becoming the
subject of kindly village gossip.

"Well, I hope this junket will turn out as Mary Beesley expects, with
enjoyment for everybody. However, I'm going to risk my back with Mr.
Silas' mules rather than with that Bessie Rutherford's wheels that are not
critter-drawn. I only hope she don't spill all my children, that I've had
such a time getting here on earth, back into Kingdom Come."

"Would you rather go in my carriage with Mrs. Tillett, and let me go with
Bess to hold in the children?" I asked with unconcealed eagerness.

"No, I don't believe so," answered Mrs. Addcock, cannily. "Sallie Tillett
is having her dress made buttoned up in the back, and she has been in the
habit of feeding the baby whenever he cries for it, though he can 'most
stand alone. She is going to depend on you and a bag of biscuit to manage
him through the show, and I'd rather not take your place."

"No; perhaps you would enjoy it