As for Grandfather Underhill, he thought with Hanny there never had been such a smart and wonderful baby. Jim taught him some rather reprehensible tricks. He was still full of fun and mischief, and already had a crowd of admirers in college.
And, oh, how they missed the baby when he was gone! It didn't seem as if one little mite could fill the house; but it was big and empty now.
John's courtship had not been so engrossing as Stephen's. They had met Miss Bradley, to be sure; and Mr. Bradley was a well-to-do man with two sons and one daughter who had been named Cleanthe, after the heroine of a story Mrs. Bradley had read in her girlhood. Mr. Bradley had wanted his daughter called Priscilla, after his mother; and Mrs. Bradley's mother's name was Jemima.
"I did think Mimy and Silly two of the worst names in the world. And there isn't any nickname for Cleanthe," was Mrs. Bradley's explanation when any one wondered at the name.
Miss Cleanthe was a very nice, well-bred, rather conventional girl, with none of Dolly's dash and spirit. She was a good housekeeper, and could make all but her best dresses. They were to take the second floor of Mr. Bradley's house, and set up their own home, until they felt rich enough to indulge in a house owned by themselves.
George came down about this time to spend a month. He was decidedly tired of farming.
"Of course, if I wanted to marry and build on the old place, it wouldn't be so bad. Uncle Faid keeps in the same rut, and you can't shake him out of it. Barton Finch is the kind of man who begins with a great flourish, but flats out towards the end. I'm tired of them all!"
"It will be your turn to marry next," said his mother. "And then I'll seem quite a young woman with only three children. I do suppose we'll go up to Yonkers some time and spend our old age there; though I begin to think your father is weaned away."
George laughed. "Father seems about half Uncle Faid's age. And at eighty, you won't be as old as Aunt Crete. If I had lots of money, to do as I liked—but farming so near by doesn't amount to much."
The Germans and Swiss had to come in and show us about market-gardening and floriculture.