Aunt Nancy Smith, who never believed in wearing her heart on her sleeve,
sniffed and thumped her cane on the floor.

"Yew young folks," she affirmed, herself having seen ninety-nine
winters, while Abigail had known but a paltry sixty-five, "yew allers go
an' cut yer pity on the skew-gee. I don't see nothin' ter bawl an'
beller erbout. I say that a'ny man what can't take kere o' himself, not
ter mention his wife, should orter go ter the poorhouse."

But the matriarch's voice quavered even more than usual, and as she
finished she hastily bent down and felt in her deep skirt-pocket for her
snuff-box.

Now the Amazonian Mrs. Homan, a widow for the third time, made sturdy
retort:

"That's jest like yew old maids--always a-blamin' the men. Yew kin jest
bet I never would have let one of my husbands go ter the poorhouse. It
would have mortified me dretful. It must be a purty poor sort of a
woman what can't take care of one man and keep a roof over his head.
Why, my second, Oliver G., used ter say--"

"Oh!" Miss Ellie wrung her hands, "can't we do somethin'?"

"I could do a-plenty," mourned Miss Abigail, "ef I only had been savin'.
Here I git a salary o' four dollars a month, an' not one penny laid
away."

"Yew fergit," spoke some one gently, "that it takes consid'able ter