n the table, had taken
up her stocking again.

"Yes Mr. Simlins--I know they are."

"Then why don't you eat one?"

"I don't want it just now, Mr. Simlins--I'd rather finish my work."

"Work!" said the farmer taking an apple. "Well--good evening! I'll go
and look after my work. I guess we'll fix it. There's a sight o' work
in the world!"

With which moral reflection Mr. Simlins departed.

"There'll be more work than sight, at this rate," said Mr. Linden when
he came back from the front door. "Mrs. Derrick, how many stockings
does Miss Faith absolutely require for one day?"

"Why I don't know sir--and I don't believe I ever did know since she
was big enough to run about," said Mrs. Derrick, her mind still
dwelling upon the house.

"Miss Faith, my question stands transferred to you."

"Why you know," said Faith, intent upon the motions of her needle,--"I
might require to _mend_ in one day what would last me to wear a good
many--and I do."

"But,

'The day is done--and the darkness
Falls from the wing of night.'"

"I never mend stockings till then," said Faith smiling over her work.
"Are Sam's apples good?"

"By reputation."

"I thought you were trying them! Why you asked me for a knife, Mr.
Linden--and I brought it."

"I'm sure I gave you an apple. Perhaps you thought it was a ball of
darning cotton."

"No, I didn't," said Faith laughing. "But what use is my apple to your
knife, Mr. Linden?"

"Not much--it has served the purposes of trade."

"But what is the purpose of trade, Mr. Linden, if the articles aren't
wanted?"

"I see you are dissatisfied with your bargain," he said. "Well, I will
be generous--you shall have the knife too;" and Mr. Linden walked away
from the table and went upstairs.

The parlour was very still after that. Faith's needle, indeed, worked
with more zeal than ever, but Mrs. Derrick rolled up her knitting and
put it in her basket, sighing a little as she did so: then sat and
thought.

"Faith, child," she said after a long pause, "do you think the Squire
would ever take our house?"

Faith hesitated, and the answer when it came was not satisfactory.

"I don't know, mother."

Mrs. Derrick sighed again, and leaned back in her chair, and rocked;
the rockers creaking in rather doleful sympathy with her thoughts. Then
an owl on a tree before the door hooted at the world generally, though
Mrs. Derrick evidently thought his remarks personal.

"I can't think why he sho