Spreading Herself.
In a country town in Maine the writer knew an elderly physician, who had married a wife much younger than himself, whose aristocratic notions hardly coincided with those of this democratic people, though she had now lived here several years. Finally a young physician came into the place and commenced practice. Among the patients that he obtained from the old doctor’s former practice was one named Higgins.
Mrs. Higgins, whose daughter had just recovered from a fever, gave a party, to which the families of both doctors, with the two ministers, and others, were invited.
“Will you go to Mrs. Higgins’s party?” asked a neighbor of the old doctor’s wife.
“Yes, I intend to go, by all means, for I want to see old Mother Higgins and her new doctor spread themselves.”
This reminds me of the following story, which is too good to be lost:—
“‘Once upon a time,’ an old lady sent her grandson to set a turkey,—not the gobbler, as did the parson in Mrs. Stowe’s ‘Minister’s Wooing.’ On his return, the following dialogue occurred:—
“‘Sammy, my dear, have you set her?’
“‘Yes, grandma,’ replied Hopeful.
