Page:Emma Speed Sampson--The shorn lamb.djvu/86

82 Major had a kinder heart than any of his children.

"He air as rockified as a coconut, but whin oncet you git through his ems' you fin' the milk er human kin'ness is thar, all right," she would declare. "But you is got ter be 'ticular 'bout how you goes ter wuck ter git that milk er you'll spill it. You got ter fin' his soft' spots same as in a coconut and then bo' in under keerful."

She was fond of Evelyn and Myra and Spottswood because they were part of the family, but she understood their limitations quite as well as their own father did. She was more lenient to their faults and quicker to see their virtues. "The po' things is done got mo' fum they maw than fum they paw, an' they maw didn't hab none ter spare," she would say to herself when something arose in the family that called for intelligence and action, and Evelyn and Myra would begin to wrangle instead of doing and Spot would stand sullenly by.

"I am much better now, Aunt Testy, and I think I'll put on my shoes and go see Aunt Pearly Gates and then go back to New York. I'd like to see Mr. Philip Bolling and tell him good-bye and thank him for all his kindness to me."