Page:An Old English Home and Its Dependencies.djvu/274

260 however, returned somewhat early. Whereupon her mistress asked, "Why, Mary! you are back very quickly!"

"Yes, ma'm," answered the domestic with flaming cheek, "a young man came up to me as soon as I arrived and axed if my programme was full—and I—I haven't eat nothink since midday. I warn't going to stay there and be insulted." I suppose my grandmother considered that after every great Christian festival or domestic conviviality my programme was overfull, for the leaden spoon and the quart bottle of castor oil invariably appeared on the scene upon the morrow. On escaping from infancy with its concomitants the bottle and spoon, I fell under a greater horror still, blue pill and senna tea. My father believed in blue pill, and also believed that a cupful of senna tea after it removed any noxious effects the calomel might be supposed to leave. What a cramping, pain-giving abomination that senna tea was! As I write, the taste of it comes upon my tongue. What another world we live in,