Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and the First Christmas of New England

n the village of Mapleton on

maker, who declared confidentially to Deacon Pitkin's wife that "she didn't see nothin' how she was goin' to get through things-and there was Saphiry's gown,

mark about the Governor, but the deacon's wife was one of the few women wh

nt New England skies are taken with a remorseful twinge and forget to give their usual snap of September frost which generall

he middle of November, yet marigolds and four-o'clocks were all ablaze in the gardens, and the golden

and go on budding and blossoming in the very teeth and snarl of oncoming winter. An autumn golden rod or aster ought to

oria of color; and the great elm that overshadowed the red Pitkin farm-house seemed like a dome of gold, an

hing the human race has a stupid hatred of trees. They embrace every chance to cut them down. They have no idea of their fitness for anything but firewood or fruit bearing. But a great cathedral elm, with shadowy aisles of boughs, its choir of whispering winds and chanting birds, its hush and

illing of turkeys-who can utter it? The very chip squirrels in the stone-walls, who have a family custom of making a market-basket of their mouths, were rushing abo

ly form of Diana Pitkin presiding over the roaring great oven which was to engulf the

that anybody who gave one look at her, whether at church or at home, always inquired at onc

about the prettiest little rosy mouth in the world, and a frequent somewhat saucy laugh, which showed a set of teeth like pearls. Add to this a quick wit, a generous though spicy temper, and

er. For if Miss Diana wished to ride or row or dance with any of the Pitkin boys, why shouldn't she? Were they not her cousins? But if any of these aforenamed young fellows advanced on the strength of these intimacies a presu

solution to tell Diana that he is not and will not be to her as a brother-that she must be to him all or nothing. James is the brightest, the tallest, and, the Mapleton gir

n shovel in one hand, and one plump white arm thrust into the oven, and her little head cocked on one side, her brows bent,

we wouldn't venture a very large wager that you are not thinking about cousin James under it all at this very minute, and that

her special particular confidante, that she knew Jim would come home from college full of conceit, and thinking that everybody

est, the bravest and kindest of your friends. But Di doesn't trouble herself with such thoughts-she only cuts out saucy mottoes from the flaky white paste to lay on the red cranberry tarts, of which she makes a special one for each cousin. For there is Bill, the second eldest, who stays at home and helps work the farm. She knows that Bill worships her very shoe-tie, and obeys all her mandates with the faithful docility of a good New

elop in the spiritual sphere as the bodily form shrinks and fades. While the cheek grows thin and the form spare, the will-power grows daily stronger; though the outer man perish, the inner man is renewed day by day. The worn hand that seems so weak yet holds every thre

carried up into the great vacant chamber, where, ranged in rows and frozen solid, they are to last over New Year's day! She adds, demonstratively clasping the little woman round the nec

ave done wonderfully. We

praising as a cat likes being stroked; but, for all that, t