"No," said Grandma Dorrance, "we'll use the small one every day, and then some time when we invite all Mrs. Cooper's family to visit us, we can use the large one."
"Oh," groaned Lilian, "don't mention Mrs. Cooper's dining-room while we're in this one."
After the dining-rooms came the kitchens, supplied with everything the most exacting housekeeper could desire; but all on the large scale requisite for a summer hotel.
"I should think anybody could cook here," said Dorothy; "and as I propose to do the cooking for the family, I'm glad everything is so complete and convenient."
"You never can cook up all these things," said Fairy, looking with awe at the rows of utensils; "not even if we have seventeen meals a day."
"Will you look at the dish towels!" exclaimed Lilian, throwing open the door of a cupboard, where hundreds of folded dish towels were arranged in neat piles.
At this climax, Mrs. Dorrance sank down on a wooden settle that stood in the kitchen, and clasping her hands, exclaimed, "It's too much, girls, it's too big; we never can do anything with it."
"Now you mustn't look at it that way, granny, dear," said Dorothy, brightly; "this is our home; and you know, be it ever so humble, there's no place like home. And if a home and all its fixings are too big, instead of too little, why, you'll have to manage it somehow just the same. Of course, I'm overpowered too, at this enormous place, but I won't own up to it! I will never admit to anybody that I think the rooms or the house unusually large. I like a big house, and I like spacious rooms! I hate to be cramped,—as possibly you may have heard me remark before."
"Good for you, Dot!" cried Leicester. "I won't be phased either. We're here, and we're here to stay. We're not going to be scared off by a few square miles of red velvet carpet, and some sixty-foot mirrors!"
"I think the place rather small, myself," said Lilian, who rarely allowed herself to be outdone in jesting; "I confess I have a little of that cramped feeling yet."