the
beginning of which seems to consist in stamping the first proposition
in Euclid all over the bed, and then poking a few seeds into the middle
of each. Why, bless the dear man! I forgot it was time for the cider.
Wouldn't you like to take it to him, John? He'd love to consult you;
and the lane is so cool, it does one's heart good to look at it."

John glanced from the steamy kitchen to the shadowy path, and answered
with a sudden assumption of immense industry,--

"I couldn't possibly go, Nan,--I've so much on my hands. You'll have
to do it yourself. 'Mr. Robert of Lincoln' has something for your
private ear; and the lane is so cool, it will do one's heart good to
see you in it. Give my regards to your father, and, in the words of
'Little Mabel's' mother, with slight variation,--

'Tell the dear old body
This day I cannot run,
For the pots are boiling over
And the mutton isn't done.'"

"I will; but please, John, go in to the girls and be comfortable; for I
don't like to leave you here," said Nan.

"You insinuate that I should pick at the pudding or invade the cream,
do you? Ungrateful girl, leave me!" And, with melodramatic sternness,
John extinguished her in his broad-brimmed hat, and offered the glass
like a poisoned goblet.

Nan took it, and went smiling away. But the lane might have been the
Desert of Sahara, for all she knew of it; and she would have passed her
father as unconcernedly as if he had been an apple-tree, had he not
called out,--

"Stand and deliver, little woman!"

She obeyed the venerable highwayman, and followed him to and fro,
listening to his plans and directions with a mute attention that quite
won his heart.

"That hop-pole is really an ornament now, Nan; this sage-bed needs
weeding,--that's good work for you girls; and, now I think of it, you'd
better water the lettuce in the cool of the evening, after I'm gone."

To all of which remarks Nan gave her assent; the hop-pole took the
likeness of a tall figure she had seen in the porch, the sage-bed,
curiously enough, suggested a strawberry ditto, the lettuce vividly
reminded her of certain vegetable productions a basket had brought, and
the bobolink only sung in his cheeriest voice, "Go home, go home! he is
there!"

She found John--he having made a free-mason of himself, by assuming her
little apron--meditating over the partially spread table, lost in amaze
at its desolate appearance; one half its proper parapherna