that I shall never sing, were all renewed and remembered as my
grandmother contemplated her picture.

I often stand, as she stood, gazing earnestly at the picture, so long
and so silently, that Prue looks up from her work and says she shall
be jealous of that beautiful belle, my grandmother, who yet makes her
think more kindly of those remote old times. "Yes, Prue, and that is
the charm of a family portrait."

"Yes, again; but," says Titbottom when he hears the remark, "how, if
one's grandmother were a shrew, a termagant, a virago?"

"Ah! in that case--" I am compelled to say, while Prue looks up again,
half archly, and I add gravely--"you, for instance, Prue."

Then Titbottom smiles one of his sad smiles, and we change the
subject.

Yet, I am always glad when Minim Sculpin, our neighbor, who knows that
my opportunities are few, comes to ask me to step round and see the
family portraits.

The Sculpins, I think, are a very old family. Titbottom says they
date from the deluge. But I thought people of English descent
preferred to stop with William the Conqueror, who came from France.

Before going with Minim, I always fortify myself with a glance at the
great family Bible, in which Adam, Eve, and the patriarchs, are
indifferently well represented.