bib under her chin, was being fed dripping spoonfuls of bread and milk
from the silver porringer which rested on the sill. The bowl was almost
on a level with her little blue shoes which she kept kicking up and down
on the step of her high-chair, wherefore the restraining hand which
seized her ankles at intervals. It was Mrs. Triplett's firm hand which
clutched her, and Mrs. Triplett's firm hand which fed her, so there was
not the usual dilly-dallying over Georgina's breakfast as when her mother
held the spoon. She always made a game of it, chanting nursery rhymes in
a gay, silver-bell-cockle-shell sort of way, as if she were one of the
"pretty maids all in a row," just stepped out of a picture book.

Mrs. Triplett was an elderly widow, a distant relative of the family, who
lived with them. "Tippy" the child called her before she could speak
plainly--a foolish name for such a severe and dignified person, but Mrs.
Triplett rather seemed to like it. Being the working housekeeper,
companion and everything else which occasion required, she had no time to
make a game of Georgina's breakfast, even if she had known how. Not once
did she stop to say, "Curly-locks, Curly-locks, wilt thou be mine?" or to
press her face suddenly against Georgina's dimpled rose-leaf cheek as if
it were somthing too temptingly dear and sweet to be resisted. She merely
said, "Here!" each time she thrust the spoon towards her.

Mrs. Triplett was in an especial hurry this morning, and did not even
look up when old Jeremy came into the room to put more wood on the fire.
In winter, when there was no garden work, Jeremy did everything about the
house which required a man's hand. Although he must have been nearly
eighty years old, he came in, tall and unbending, with a big log across
his shoulder. He walked stiffly, but his back was as straight as the long
poker with which he mended the fire.