"I don't recollect, grand-aunt. I was a little girl, and so much flattered that I thought everything he did was perfect."
"Ah me!" exclaimed Mrs. Tilghman, pulling the feather of her turban up, and looking as much like an old belle as possible at eighty years of age; "you danced before Lafayette with my grandson Bill. Bill hardly remembers Lafayette at all, thinking of you that night, so wonderful in your girl's charms. I told him Vesta would never marry him, as he was too plain and poor. But I never thought you would marry that—"
Here Rhoda sniffled warningly.
"Yes," exclaimed the old lady, catching the sniffle; "I never thought you would marry that! But Bill is as dear a fool as ever. He says now that Meshach Milburn is a good man, too. I never thought he was above a—"
Rhoda sniffled earnestly.
"Precisely that," exclaimed the old lady; "that was my estimate of the stock. Bill says he is a financial genius. I don't see what is to become of girls in this generation. Here is Ellenora, too good to marry Phœbus, the sailor man, too poor to marry anybody else; now, if Milburn had married her and taken her son Levin into his business, it would have been reasonable; but to take you and pervert your happiness, almost makes me—"
Sniffle from Rhoda.
"Yes," said the old lady, snappishly; "almost! But I never did do it yet."
"Did you ever see Gineral Washin'ton, mem?" Rhoda asked. "I thought, maybe, you was old enough. Misc Somers, she see him up yer to Kint River a-crossin' to 'Napolis. He was a-swarin' at the cappen of the piriauger and a dammin' of the Eas'n Shu, and he said they wan't no good rudes in Marylan' nohow; that the Wes'n Shu was all red mud, an' the Eas'n Shu yaller mud, an' the bay was jus' pizen. Misc Somers say she don't think it was Gineral Washin'ton, caze he cuss so. She goin' to find out when she kin git a book an' somebody to read outen it to her, caze she dreffle smart."
"Grand-aunt Tilghman," Vesta interposed to the blank silence of the room, "knew General Washington intimately."