You see, their yard is large and shady, and the little thing havin’ got so it could run alone, would be out in the yard, a-playin’ round, most all the time. It was dretful good for her, and she enjoyed it, and Tirzah Ann enjoyed it, too; for after she got her work done up, all she had to do was to set in the door, and watch that little, pretty thing a-playin’ round, and bein’ perfectly happy.
It was a fair and lovely evenin’, though very warm; my salaratus had nearly gi’n out, and I had made the last drawin’ of tea for supper, and so, when I had got the dishes washed up, and Josiah had milked, he hitched up the old mare, and calm and serene in our two minds as the air of the evenin’, we rode down to Janesville, to get these necessarys, and a little beefsteak for breakfast, and see the children.
We found that Thomas J. and Maggie had gone to tea to her folkses, that afternoon, but Tirzah Ann and Whitfield wus to home, and I don’t want to see a prettier sight than I see, as we druv up.
There Tirzah Ann sat out on the portico, all dressed up in a cool, mull dress—it was one I bought for her, before she was married, but it wus washed and done up clean, and looked as good as new. It was pure white, with little bunches of blue forget-me-nots on it, and she had a bunch of the same posys in her hair and in the bosom of her frock, (there is a hull bed of ’em in the yard.) She is a master hand for dressin’ up, and lookin’ pretty, but at the same time, would be very equinomical, if she wus let alone. She looked the picture of health and enjoyment, plump and rosy, and happy as a queen. And she was a queen. Queen of her husband’s heart, and settin’ up on that pure and lofty throne of constant and deathless love, she looked first-rate, and felt so.
It had been a very warm day, really hot, and Whitfield, I s’pose, had come home kinder tired, so he had stretched himself out at full length on the grass, in front of the portico; and there he lay, with his hands clasped under his head, a-talkin’ and laughin’, and lookin’ up into Tirzah Ann’s face, as radiant and lovin’ as if she was the sun, and he a sunflower. But that simily, though very poetical and figurative, don’t half express the good looks, and health, and happiness on both their faces, as they looked at each other, and that babe, that most beautifulest of children, a-toddlin’ round, first up to one, and then the other, with her bright eyes a-dancin’, and her cheeks red as roses.
But the minute she ketched sight of her grandpa and me and the mare, she jest run down to the gate, as fast as her little legs could carry her, and I guess she got a pretty good kissin’ from Josiah and me. And Whitfield and Tirzah Ann came hurryin’ down to the gate, glad enough to see us, as they always be. Josiah, of course, had to take that beautiful child for a little ride, and Whitfield said he guessed he would go, too. So I got out, and went in, and as we sot there on the stoop, Tirzah Ann up and told me what she and Whitfield wus a-goin’ to do. They wus agoin’ away for a rest.
“Why,” said I, “I hardly ever, in my hull life, see anybody look so rested as you do now, both on you. How, under the sun, can you be rested any more than you be now?”
“Well,” she said, “it’s so very genteel to go. Mrs. Skidmore is a-goin’, and Mrs. Skidmore says nobody who made any pretensions to bein’ genteel stayed to home durin’ the heated term, no matter how cool the place wus they wus a-livin’ in.”
“What do they go for mostly?” says I, in a very cool way; for I didn’t like the idee.
“Oh, for health and——”