that 'folks should come and trade to Almiry's shop after promisin'
they would, and she havin' took a lease of the place on account of
them lies.' I wanted to laugh, but dared not do it, so just let her
croak, for the daughter had to go to her customers. The old lady's
tirade informed me that they came from Vermont, had 'been wal on 't
till father died and the farm was sold.' Then it seems the women
came to Boston and got on pretty well till 'a stroke of numb-palsy,'
whatever that is, made the mother helpless and kept Almiry at home
to care for her. I can't tell you how funny and yet how sad it was
to see the poor old soul, so full of energy and yet so helpless, and
the daughter so discouraged with her pathetic little shop and no
customers to speak of. I did not know what to say till 'Grammer
Miller,' as the children call her, happened to say, when she took up
her knitting after the lecture, 'If folks who go spendin' money
reckless on redic'lus toys for Christmas only knew what nice things,
useful and fancy, me and Almiry could make ef we had the goods,
they'd jest come round this corner and buy 'em, and keep me out of a
Old Woman's Home and that good, hard-workin' gal of mine out of a
'sylum; for go there she will ef she don't get a boost somehow, with
rent and firin' and vittles all on her shoulders, and me only able
to wag them knittin'-needles.'

"'I will buy things here, and tell all my friends about it, and I
have a drawer full of pretty bits of silk and velvet and plush, that
I will give Miss Miller for her work, if she will let me.' I added
that, for I saw that Almiry was rather proud, and hid her troubles
under a grim look.

"That pleased the old lady, and, lowering her voice, she said, with
a motherly sort of look in her beady eyes: 'Seein' as you are so