"I'll set a day with him this very night," responded Mrs. Judy, all
undone with pride. Nothing in the world could have pleased the
hospitable country women more than the parties that Doctor Tom had
been improvising for the amusement of the singer girl. Before each
visit he openly and boldly made demands of each friend for her CHEF-
D'OEUVRE and consumed the same heartily and with delight in the
stranger's growing appetite.

"If you folks don't stop spoiling Tom Mayberry I won't never be able
to get him a wife. I'll have to take little Bettie to raise and
teach her how to bit and bridle him," laughed Mother Mayberry, as
they all rose and flocked to the front porch.

In the Road in front of the house had congregated the entire school
of small-fry, drawn by the mother lode, but too well trained to
think of making any kind of interruption to the gathering. They were
busily engaged in a tag and tally riot which was led on one side by
Eliza and the other by Henny Turner, whose generalship could hardly
be said to equal that of his younger and feminine opponent. Teether
and little Hoover sat in the Pike wheelbarrow which was drawn up
beside the Pike gate, and attached thereto by long gingham strings
were Martin Luther and little Bettie. They champed the gingham bits
drawn through their mouths and pranced with their little bare feet
in the dust, as Eliza found time every minute or two to call out
"whoa" or cut at them with a switch as she flashed past them. They
were distinctly of the game and were blissfully unconscious of the
fact that they were not in it. This arrangement for keeping them
happy, though out of the way, had been of Eliza's contriving and did
credit to her wit in many senses of the word.