"You'd better take care, Cerinthy Ann," said her mother; "they say that
'those who sing before breakfast will cry before supper.' Girls talk
about getting married," she said, relapsing into a gentle didactic
melancholy, "without realizing its awful responsibilities."

"Oh, as to that," said Cerinthy, "I've been practising on my pudding
now these six years, and I shouldn't be afraid to throw one up chimney
with any girl."

This speech was founded on a tradition, current in those times, that no
young lady was fit to be married till she could construct a boiled
Indian-pudding of such consistency that it could be thrown up chimney
and come down on the ground, outside, without breaking; and the
consequence of Cerinthy Ann's sally was a general laugh.

"Girls a'n't what they used to be in my day," sententiously remarked an
elderly lady. "I remember my mother told me when she was thirteen she
could knit a long cotton stocking in a day."

"I haven't much faith in these stories of old times,--have you, girls?"
said Cerinthy, appealing to the younger members at the frame.

"At any rate," said Mrs. Twitchel, "our minister's wife will be a
pattern; I don't know anybody that goes beyond her either in spinning
or fine stitching."

Mary sat as placid and disengaged as the new moon, and listened to the
chatter of old and young with the easy quietness of a young heart that
has early outlived life, and looks on everything in the world from some