"Well, and how dost thou get on at housekeeping?" asked Aunt Eunice. "I should say thou hast a nice, convenient house."
"It is very small," said Agnes, sighing. "I think it's very hard to keep such a little place in order. Don't you?"
"Well, perhaps so; but I should say the house was large enough for thee and thy husband. How many rooms has it?"
"Only six,—five, that is, besides the kitchen; and two of them are little more than closets."
"That gives thee two bedrooms, besides kitchen and parlour, and abundant storeroom. When I first went to housekeeping in this part of the country, I had only one room for kitchen, parlour and bedroom."
"How did you ever live?" asked Agnes.
"Oh, nicely. I don't know that I have ever enjoyed myself more in my life than when I lived in that log house; though the wolves used to come unpleasantly near, the first winter or two. I remember once I was alone in the house. Thy uncle had been called away to watch with a neighbour who was very sick, and I sat knitting by the fire-light, when a slight noise at the window caused me to look round, and there I saw the eyes of a wolf glaring at me out of the darkness."
"Horrible!" exclaimed both the girls. "What did you do?"
"I raised my heart to God for protection; and, having quieted my first fears in that way, I threw a quantity of dry light wood on the fire, so as to make a great blaze, and then took down my husband's gun, which was always loaded, and hung near the bed. Then—now, don't look for any thing very heroic—I snatched up an iron hook and a tin pan which stood near, and ran towards the window, drumming with all my might and making a frightful noise. The wolf, who I suppose had never heard such music, turned and fled, and I did not see him again. But you can imagine that I did not sleep much that night. My great fear was that the brute might be the advance-guard of a pack, and that my husband, coming home in the gray dusk of the morning, might encounter them.
"We found afterwards there were really more than a dozen of them; but the neighbour was so low that Jacob did not leave him till after sunrise, when he died. He told me that when he came across the lot and saw the creature's footsteps in the snow, his heart died within him, and he had hardly strength to reach the house. Indeed, I think he was the palest man I ever saw, when I opened the door."