to be embroidered with roses. In a few days the piano-cover,
exquisitely finished, was triumphantly brought for Mrs. Thomas
Stevenson's inspection, but that lady, shocked at this American
strenuousness, threw up her hands and exclaimed: "Oh, Fanny! How could
you! That piece should have lasted you all summer!"

Thomas Stevenson, however, was far more formidable; to the female
members of his family his word was law, but to his pretty
daughter-in-law he capitulated--horse, foot, and dragoons--and his son
was heard to say that he had never seen his father so completely
subjugated. It is true, on the other hand, that she made every effort
to please him, and took pains not to offend his old-fashioned and
rigidly conventional ideas. For instance, when he objected to black
stockings, which were just then coming into vogue for ladies, she
yielded to his prejudice and always wore white ones while at his
house. He had a deep respect for her judgment in literary matters, and
made his son promise "never to publish anything without her approval."
This regard was mutual, and she said of him: "I shall always believe
that something unusual and great was lost to the world in Thomas
Stevenson. One could almost see the struggle between the creature of
cramped hereditary conventions and the man nature had intended him to
be." As his health failed he grew to depend upon her more and more,
and there was between them an interchange of much friendliness and
many little jests. A rather amusing thing happened once when the two
were together in London picking out furnishings for the house he had
bought for her at Bournemouth. One afternoon they dropped in at a
hotel for tea. It had been ordered by the doctors that he should have
bicarbonate of soda in his tea, which it seems he did not like if he
saw it put in, but if he did not see it never knew the difference.
When the tea was brought his daughter-in-law, having diverted his
attention, slyly dropped in the soda. Glancing up, she saw in the
looking-glass the reflection of the horrified face of the waiter. When
she told this story to her husband he immediately began to weave a
thrilling plot around the suspicion that might have fallen upon her if
her father-in-law had happened to die suddenly just then, especially
as his son was his chief heir. Uncle Tom, as she usually called him,
had all sorts of pet names for her, but the usual remark was "I doot
ye're a besom."[18] She was in all ways a true