go too! But she won’t, and she couldn’t if she would, with the other children depending on her. Dear, dear! what shall we do?’

“The poor girl put her head on my shoulder and cried; and if I should own up to the truth, I suppose I cried a little too. For where’s the man that can hold a sweet woman’s head on his shoulder, while she sobs out her trouble, and he hasn’t any power to help her—who, I say, can do any less, in such circumstances, than drop a tear or two for company?

“‘Never mind; don’t hurry,’ says Mrs. Jedwort. ‘Be patient, and wait awhile, and it’ll all turn out right, I’m sure.’

“‘Yes, you always say, “Be patient, and wait!’” says Maria, brushing back her hair. ‘But, for my part, I’m tired of waiting, and my patience has given out long ago. We can’t always live in this way, and we may as well make a change now as ever. But I can’t bear the thought of going and leaving you.’

“Here the two younger girls came in, and seeing that crying was the order of the day, they began to cry; and when they heard Maria talk of going, they declared they would go; and even little Willie, the four- year-old, began to howl.

“‘There, there! Maria! Lottie! Susie!’ said Mrs. Jedwort in her calm way; ‘Willie, hush up! I don’t know what we are to do; but I feel that something is going to happen that will show us the right way, and we are to wait. Now go and wash the dishes, and set the cheese.’

“That was just after breakfast, the second day of the moving; and sure enough, something like what she prophesied did happen before another sun.

“The old frame held together pretty well till along toward night, when the steeple showed signs of seceding. ‘There she goes! She’s falling now!’ sung out the boys, who had been hanging around all day in hopes of seeing the thing tumble.

“The house was then within a few rods of where Jedwort wanted it; but Bob stopped right there, and said it wasn’t safe to haul it another inch. ‘That steeple’s bound to come down, if we do,’ says he.

“‘Not by a dumbed sight, it a’n’t,’ says Jedwort. ‘Them cracks a’n’t nothin’; the j’ints is all firm yit.’ He wanted Bob to go up and examine; but Bob shook his head—the concern looked too shaky. Then he told me to go up, but I said I hadn’t lived quite long enough, and had a little rather be smoking my pipe on terra firma. Then the boys began to hoot. ‘Dumbed if ye a’n’t all a set of cowards,’ says he. ‘I’ll go up myself.’

“We waited outside while he climbed up inside. The boys jumped on the ground to jar the steeple and make it fall. One of them blew a horn—as he said, to bring down the old Jericho—and another thought he’d help things along by starting up the horse and giving the building a little wrench. But Bob put a stop to that; and finally out came a head from the belfry window. It was Jedwort, who shouted down to us: ‘There a’n’t a j’int or brace gin out. Start the hoss, and I’ll ride. Pass me up that ’ere horn, and—’

“Just then there came a cracking and loosening of timbers, and we that stood nearest had only time to jump out of the way, when down came the steeple crashing to the ground, with Jedwort in it.”

“I hope it killed the cuss,” said one of the village story-tellers.

“Worse than that,” replied my friend; “it just cracked his skull —not enough to put an end to his miserable life, but only to take away what little sense he had. We got the doctors to him, and they patched up his broken head; and by George it made me mad to see the fuss the women-folks made over him. It would have been my way to let him die; but they were as anxious and attentive to him as if he had been the