'em he gave five dollars towards the other one, twenty years ago, 'n'
hadn't never got a cent's worth o' use out of it. That's Deacon Pennell
all over! As Si says, if the grace o' God wa'n't given to all of us
without money 'n' without price, you wouldn't never hev ketched Deacon
Pennell experiencin' religion! It's got to be a free gospel 't would
convict him o' sin, that's certain! ... They say Seth Thatcher's married
out in Iowy. His mother's tickled 'most to death. She heerd he was
settin' up with a girl out there, 'n' she was scairt to death for fear
he'd get served as Lemuel 'n' Cyrus was. The Thatcher boys never hed any
luck gettin' married, 'n' they always took disappointments in love
turrible hard. You know Cyrus set in that front winder o' Mis'
Thatcher's, 'n' rocked back 'n' forth for ten year, till he wore out
five cane-bottomed cheers, 'n' then rocked clean through, down cellar,
all on account o' Crany Ann Sweat. Well, I hope she got her comeuppance
in another world,--she never did in this; she married well 'n' lived in
Boston.... Mis' Thatcher hopes Seth 'll come home to live. She's dretful
lonesome in that big house, all alone. She'd oughter have somebody for a
company-keeper. She can't see nothin' but trees 'n' cows from her
winders.... Beats all, the places they used to put houses.... Either
they'd get 'em right under foot so 't you'd most tread on 'em when you
walked along the road, or else they'd set 'em clean back in a lane,
where the women folks couldn't see face o' clay week in 'n' week out....

"Joel Whitten's widder's just drawed his pension along o' his bein' in
the war o' 1812. ... It's took 'em all these years to fix it. ... Massy
sakes! don't some folks have their luck buttered in this world?... She
was his fourth wife, 'n' she never lived with him but thirteen days
'fore he up 'n' died. ... It doos seem's if the guv'ment might look
after things a little mite closer.... Talk about Joel Whitten's bein' in
the war o' 1812! Everybody knows Joel Whitten wouldn't have fit a