"It is the Peabodys', I know it, because the aisle runs right up facin'
it. I can see old Deacon Peabody settin' in this end same as if 'twas
yesterday."

"He had died before Jere and I came back here to live," said Mrs.
Burbank. "The first I remember, Justin Peabody sat in the end seat; the
sister that died, next, and in the corner, against the wall, Mrs.
Peabody, with a crepe shawl and a palm-leaf fan. They were a handsome
family. You used to sit with them sometimes, Nancy; Esther was great
friends with you."

"Yes, she was," Nancy replied, lifting the tattered cushion from its
place and brushing it; "and I with her.--What is the use of scrubbing and
carpeting, when there are only twenty pew-cushions and six hassocks in
the whole church, and most of them ragged? How can I ever mend this?"

"I shouldn't trouble myself to darn other people's cushions!"

This unchristian sentiment came in Mrs. Miller's ringing tones from the
rear of the church.

"I don't know why," argued Maria Sharp. "I'm going to mend my Aunt
Achsa's cushion, and we haven't spoken for years; but hers is the next
pew to mine, and I'm going to have my part of the church look decent,
even if she is too stingy to do her share. Besides, there aren't any
Peabodys left to do their own darning, and Nancy was friends with
Esther."

"Yes, it's nothing more than right," Nancy replied, with a note of relief