powerful' low in her sperrits the last I seed."

"Pore maw!" sighed Marthy, her soft voice vibrant with sympathy.
"It looks like things is harder for her all the time. Something new
to ruminate on seems to lift her up a spell and make her forgit her
blindness. She has heared tell of you school-women and your quare
doings, and is sort of curious."

"She is blind?" inquired the nurse.

"Blind as a bat these twelve year'," replied Mrs. Chilton; "it fell
on her as a judgment for rebelling when Evy, her onliest little gal,
was took. She died of the breast-complaint; some calls it the
galloping consumpt'."

"I allus allowed if Uncle Joshuay and them other preachers had
a-helt off and let maw alone a while in her grief," broke in
Marthy's gentle voice, "she never would have gone so far. But Uncle
Joshuay in especial were possessed to pester her, and inquire were
she yet riconciled to the will of God, and warn her of judgment if
she refused."

"Doubtless Uncle Joshuay's high talk did agg her on," said Mrs.
Chilton, impartially, "but she need n't to have blasphemed like she
done at Evy's funeral occasion."

Marthy covered her face with her hands.

"Oh, that day!" she exclaimed, shuddering. "Will I ever forgit it?
John and me had got married just a month before Evy died in October,