Page:The Atlantic Monthly Volume 2.djvu/429

 own a lot of maple-sugar from Lee, and when we wanted molasses we made it out of that. We didn't have to buy no great of groceries, for we could spin and knit by fire-light, and, part of the land bein' piny woods, we had a good lot of knots that were as bright as lamps for all we wanted. Then we had a dozen chickens, and by pains and care they laid pretty well, and the eggs were as good as gold. So we lived through the first year after father died, pretty well.

Anybody that couldn't get along with mother and Major (I always called Mary Jane "Major" when I was real little, and the name kind of stayed by) couldn't get along with anybody. I was as happy as a cricket whilst they were by, though, to speak truth, I wasn't naturally so chirpy as they were; I took after father more, who was a kind of a despondin' man, down-hearted, never thinkin' things could turn out right, or that he was goin' to have any luck. That was my natur', and mother see it, and fought ag'inst it like a real Bunker-Hiller; but natur' is hard to root up, and there was always times when I wanted to sulk away into a corner and think nobody wanted me, and that I was poor and humbly, and had to work for my living.

I remember one time I'd gone up into my room before tea to have one of them dismal fits. Miss Perrit had been in to see mother, and she'd been tellin' over what luck Nancy'd had down to Hartford: how't she had gone into a shop, and a young man had been struck with her good looks, an' he'd turned out to be a master-shoemaker, and Nancy was a-goin' to be married, and so on, a rigmarole as long as the moral law,--windin' up with askin' mother why she didn't send us girls off to try our luck, for Major was as old as Nance Perrit. I'd waited to hear mother say, in her old bright way, that she couldn't afford it, and she couldn't spare us, if she had the means, and then I flung up into our room, that was a lean-to in the garret, with a winder in the gable end, and there I set down by the winder with my chin on the sill, and begun to wonder why we couldn't have as good luck as the Perrits. After I'd got real miserable, I heerd a soft step comin' up stairs, and Major come in and looked at me and then out of the winder.

"What's the matter of you, Anny?" said she.

"Nothing," says I, as sulky as you please.

"Nothing always means something," says Major, as pleasant as pie; and then she scooched down on the floor and pulled my two hands away, and looked me in the face as bright and honest as ever you see a dandelion look out of the grass. "What is it, Anny? Spit it out, as John Potter says; you'll feel better to free your mind."

"Well," says I, "Major, I'm tired of bad luck."

"Why, Anny! I didn't know as we'd had any. I'm sure, it's three years since father died, and we have had enough to live on all that time, and I've got my schooling, and we are all well; and just look at the apple-trees,--all as pink as your frock with blossoms; that's good for new cloaks next winter, Anny."

"'Ta'n't that, Major. I was thinkin' about Nancy Perrit. If we'd had the luck to go to Hartford, may-be you'd have been as well off as she; and then I'd have got work, too. And I wish I was as pretty as she is, Major; it does seem too bad to be poor and humbly too."

I wonder she didn't laugh at me, but she was very feelin' for folks, always. She put her head on the window-sill along of mine, and kinder nestled up to me in her lovin' way, and said, softly,--

"I wouldn't quarrel with the Lord, Anny."

"Why, Major! you scare me! I haven't said nothing against the Lord. What do you mean?" said I,--for I was touchy, real touchy.

"Well, dear, you see we've done all we can to help ourselves; and what's over and above, that we can't help,--that is what the Lord orders, a'n't it? and He made you, didn't He? You can't change your face; and I'm glad of it, for it is