The House

e were anxious to share the delights of the Eden which was to be ours. It transpired all too early in the proceedings, however, that the processes of the law are exceedingly exacting an

nnot see what there was left for a lawyer to do. With a magnanimity and generosity which bespoke the largeness of his nature, Mr. Denslow volunteered his services as counsellor to the wary widow, and I confess that I should have interposed no objection to having this versatile friend serve in this capacity. But

air. Alice and Mr. Denslow and I agreed that, if we had been left to ourselves, we could have settled the business with the widow Schmittheimer in half a day. However, I suppose that the lawyers must have a chan

nificent friend Mr. Black, for that estimable person, being aware of my predilection for ancient armor and other curios, found it difficult to disabuse his mind of the suspicion that his one thousand dollars might have been div

ch served (as I was told) as security to the widow Schmittheimer in case of "default in payment of interest or principal."

was wholly proper and businesslike, and Alice paid no heed to my expostulations. Never before had I had any experience in matters or with instruments of this kind, and I will admit that

and her kuchen and who now regaled her (in compensation, as it were, for her past hospitality) with reproachful assurances that she had been virtually swindled out of her beautiful property. The grief of this lonely and amiable woman touched me to the core, and I sought to assuage

this period that Adah met with one of those sorrows which benumb the sensitive feminine heart. In a moment of vandalism ever to be deprecated, little Erasmus discovered and took possession of that copy of "The National Architect" which contained the picture of the plutocratic villa at Narraganset

aria herself upon a fly leaf excerpted from Maria's favorite volume, "The Life of Mary Lyon") would soon be forwarded for our enlightenment and delectation. Maria felt kindly toward us, and her sympathies had been awakened to their very

ouse. When we got through with that dilly-dallying, shilly-shallying Lawyer Meisterbaum, Alice and I found out that

um, and he had a shop in Osgood Avenue, opposite one of our most fashionable and most prosperous cemeteries. Mrs. Denslow always called him Uncle Si, and this circumstance rather prejudiced me in favor of him. The facts, too, that Uncle Si was not o

honest son of toil. His modest place of business was

, CARPENTE

OXES A S

bably sympathize with me when I admit that Mr. Plum's sign did not inspire me with that enthusiasm which is at least comforting to the possessor. The reference to Mr. Plum's "speciality" was what cast a temp

syllabic, and this peculiarity pleased me, for I have always admired and always cultivated directness and terseness, there being nothing else more distasteful to me than the prolixity, diffuseness, pleonasm, amplification, redundance, and copia verborum of some people. I told Uncle Si all

will be till I know what

out "closets" and a "new hall," and "hardwood floors" and-and-and things of that kind; I remembered having heard some discussion of a prospective "addition," and-yes-I now recalled that the front porch would have to b

, and involving gravel walks between flower beds and under umbrageous trees; exotics perennially in bloom; Swiss tree boxes, from which the lark carolled by day and the nightingale w

Our many and long and earnest conversations with the neighbors had determined numerous important points. We didn't want a roof like the Baylors' roof; nor water-pipes like the Rushes'; nor backstairs like the Tiltmans'; nor plastering like the Denslows'; nor dormer-windows like the Carters'; nor a kitchen sink like the Plunkers'; nor smoky c

nt or intimation of what would be expected of him. I am the last man in the world to discourage wh