"I warn't contradictin', I was talkin'," replied young Adam, abashed by the evident disapprobation that surrounded him.
"Well, don't talk, suh, until you can talk sense," rejoined his father. "When a talker has turned ninety an' can meet me on equal ground, I'll consent to argue with him."
His lower lip protruded threateningly from his toothless gums, while two tears of anger rolled slowly out of his eyes and over his veined and roughened cheeks to the crescent shaped hollow of his chin. So deeply rooted in his mind was the conviction that his ninety years furnished an unanswerable argument for the truth of his opinions, that the assurance of experience had conferred upon him something of that manner of superhuman authority with which the assurance of inexperience had endowed Mr. Mullen.
"I for one was al'ays against Abel's marrying," interposed Betsey with a placable air. "I knew she'd be a drag on him, an' now that he's goin' into politics with sech good chances, the mo's the pity. I've told him so time and agin when he stopped at the or'nary."
At this point the appearance of Solomon Hatch caused her to explain hurriedly, "We were jest speakin' of Abel an' his chances for the Legislature. You've got a mighty good son-in-law, Solomon."
"Yes," said Solomon, sourly, "yes, but Judy's a fool."
The confession had burst from an overburdened soul, for like Gay he could tolerate no divergence from the straight line of duty, no variation from the traditional type, in any woman who was related to him. Men would be men, he was aware, but if any phrase so original as "women will be women" had been propounded to him, he would probably have retorted with philosophic cynicism, that "he did not see the necessity." His vision was enclosed in a circle beyond which he could not penetrate even if he had desire to, and the conspicuous fact within this circle at the moment was that Judy had made a fool of herself—that she had actually burst out crying in church when Mr. Mullen had announced his acceptance of a distant call! He was sorry for Abel, because Judy was his wife, but, since it is human nature to exaggerate the personal element, he was far sorrier for himself because she was his daughter.
"Yes, Judy's a fool," he repeated angrily, and there was a bitter comfort in the knowledge that he had first put into words the thought that had engaged every mind at the ordinary.
"Oh, she's young yet, an' she'll outgrow it," observed Betsey as sincerely as she had made the opposite remark some minutes before. "A soft heart is mo' to be pitied than blamed, an' it'll soon harden into shape now she's settled down to matrimony."
"I ain't never seen a female with an ounce of good hard sense except you, Mrs. Bottom," replied Solomon. "Thar's a contrariness in the rest of 'em that makes 'em tryin' companions to a rational critter like man, with a firm grip on his heart. To think of gittin' a husband like Abel Revercomb—the risin' man in the county—an' then to turn aside from the comforts of life on o'count of nothin' mo' than a feelin'."