iss Jerusha's memorable "house-cleaning" was over, and the cottage having been polished till it shone, and everything inside and outside reduced to the frightfully clean state that characterized everything belonging to that worthy lady, she was prepared to sit down and enjoy the reward of her labors, and the pleasure of an approving conscience. Fly and Betsey Periwinkle, who had been in an excessively damp and limber state for the last few days, and whom Miss Jerusha had kept tearing in and out and up and down like a couple of comets, were at last permitted to dry out, and might now safely venture to call their souls their own again.
Georgia, who rather liked a fuss than otherwise, quite enjoyed the house-cleaning, and spent an unusually large portion of her valuable time at the cottage while that domestic revolution was in full blast; now that it was over, she began to resume her slightly vagabondish habit of roaming round the country, always up to her eyes in business, yet never bringing about any particular result excepting that of mischief. When Georgia wished to enjoy the pleasures of solitude, which was not often, she strolled off to the beach, where, perched on top of a high rock, she meditated on the affairs of the State, or whatever other subject happened to weigh on her mind at the moment.
One morning she started off for her favorite seat in order to have a quite read, having inveigled Miss Jerusha out of the "Pilgrim's Progress" for that purpose, in lieu of something more entertaining. Now this beach being so far removed from Burnfield, its solitude was rarely, if ever, disturbed; therefore, great was Georgia's surprise upon reaching it, to find a shady spot under her own favorite rock already occupied.
Miss Georgia came to a sudden halt, and, standing on tiptoe, gravely surveyed the new-comer, herself unseen.
Under the shadow of the overhanging rock, on the warm sands, lay a tall, slight, fashionably dressed youth, of sixteen or thereabouts, with handsome, regular features, a complexion of feminine fairness, a profusion of brown, curling hair, a high forehead, and unusually and aristocratically small hands and feet, the former as white as a lady's. The predominating expression of his face was a mixture of indolence and drollery; and as he lay there, with his half closed eyes, he looked the very picture of the dolce far niente.
"Well, now," thought Georgia, "I wonder who you are, and where you came from. I'll just go and ask him, though I do believe he's asleep. If he is, I reckon I'll wake him in double-quick time."
And Georgia, not being in the slightest degree troubled with that disease incident to youth, previous to the days of Young America, yclept bashfulness, marched up to the intruder, and planting herself before him, put her arms akimbo, and assuming a look of stern investigation, began:
"Ahem! See here, you, where did you come from?"
The young gentleman thus addressed leisurely opened a pair of large, dark eyes, and quietly surveyed his interrogator from head to foot, without disturbing himself in the slightest degree, or betraying the smallest intention of moving.
Very properly provoked at this aggravating conduct, Georgia's voice rose an octave higher, as she said, authoritatively: