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310 Joel Bell was an amazed witness of the Slumber Day ceremonies. What they represented he could not imagine; why “great girls like these should carry on so” he could still less imagine. He wheeled barrowloads of straw and leaves, dug and tied and trenched, with unvarying gravity, but his pitying disapproval peeped forth.

Noon afforded the first moment when conversation was possible. One of the unwritten laws of Slumber Day was that no talking was allowed; participants in ceremonies are not supposed to converse while they are going on. Joel availed himself of this interlude.

“Say, Mis’ Garden,” he began, “about that nus’ry you was thinkin’ of foundin’. Seem’s if it couldn’t hardly be, ’thout they was a widder, or some such woman, ready to let the children be dumped with her. Who’d look after ’em?”

“We were saying just that, Bell,” said Mrs. Garden. “My daughters thought we could find such a person, but so far none has been suggested. Do you know one?”

Joel Bell shook his head. “Fact, I don’t,” he said. “I spoke to one woman, but she quick showed she thought I meant her to take Mis’ Bell’s place, my wife’s, you know, or else she