ery one, and yet there was something about them strange and
unfamiliar. They were all a little afraid of each other, as people
are apt to be when they are well dressed and met together for social
purposes in the country. To be at a real party was a novel thing for
most of them, and put a constraint upon them which they could not at
once overcome. Perhaps it was because they were in the awful
parlor,--that carpeted room of haircloth furniture, which was so
seldom opened. Upon the wall hung two certificates framed in black,
--one certifying that, by the payment of fifty dollars, Deacon Mayhew
was a life member of the American Tract Society, and the other that,
by a like outlay of bread cast upon the waters, his wife was a life
member of the A. B. C. F. M., a portion of the alphabet which has an
awful significance to all New England childhood. These certificates
are a sort of receipt in full for charity, and are a constant and
consoling reminder to the farmer that he has discharged his religious
duties.

There was a fire on the broad hearth, and that, with the tallow
candles on the mantelpiece, made quite an illumination in the room,
and enabled the boys, who were mostly on one side of the room, to see
the girls, who were on the other, quite plainly. How sweet and
demure the girls looked, to be sure! Every boy was thinking if his
hair was slick, and feeling the full embarrassment of his entrance
into fashionable life. It was queer that these children, who were so
free everywhere else, should be so constrained now, and not know what
to do with themselves. The shooting of a spark out upon the carpet
was a great relief, and was accompanied by a deal of scrambling to
throw it back into the fire, and caused much giggling. It was only
gradually that the formality was at all broken, and the young people
got together and found their tongues.

John at length found himself with Cynthia Rudd, to his great delight
and considerable embarrassment, for Cynthia, who was older than John,
never looked so pretty. To his surprise he had nothing to say to
her. They had always found plenty to talk about before--but now
nothing that he could think of seemed worth saying at a party.

"It is a pleasant evening," said John.

"It is quite so," replied Cynthia.

"Did you come in a cutter?" asked John anxiously.

"No; I walked on the crust, and it was perfectly lovely walking,"
said Cynthia, in a burst of confidence.

"Was it slippery?" conti