Under the glass globe, in which two or three chilly lights seemed longing to go out, the ghost of a table was spread, with a great deal of silver, and very little to eat.
"Just a cup of coffee and a mouthful of toast before we start," says E. E., sitting down behind a great silver urn in her furs and her beehive; "for my own part, I could do without that."
She poured me out a cup of coffee—it was half cold and awfully riley—and asked me to help myself to a piece of toast, which had black bars across it, as if it had been striped on a gridiron.
"Things are getting cold," says E. E., "they have been standing so long. The cook has been out an hour; but she knows I consider this my penance."
"Out where?" says I.
"An hour?" says I; "why I thought we were going to early service. It isn't daylight yet."
"I know," says Cousin E. E., with a sigh, "but her church is a little higher than ours."
"Higher," says I; "then there is some meeting-house a notch above yours?"
"Yes, cousin," says she, mournfully, "but we are creeping up. Every year brings us a step nearer."