"Just so, sister Judy," responded Miss Sophia, with positively inflexible firmness and almost abrupt promptness, when she now began to understand that eating was in question.
"It is really a very simple matter to arrange a tea," Miss Judy went on eagerly, her sweet face growing rosy. "There's mother's sea-shell china, so thin, so pink, and so refined. And there's her best tea-cloth that she planted the flax for, and bleached and spun and wove and hemstitched—all with her own dear hands. I am sure that the darn in the middle of it won't show at all, if we set the cut-glass bowl over it. And we can fill the bowl so full of maiden's blush roses that the nick out of the side will never be seen. Mother's sea-shell china and the blushes are about the same color. Why, I can actually see the table now—as if it were a picture—all a delicate, lovely pink!" cried little Miss Judy, blushing with eagerness, and all a delicate, lovely pink herself. "And the food must be as dainty as the table. Something very light and appetizing. Isn't that your idea, sister Sophia?"
Miss Sophia assented as usual, but not quite so promptly, nor quite so cordially, and anybody but Miss Judy must have seen how her face fell. She had known so many things that were light and appetizing, and so few that were really satisfying—poor Miss Sophia!
"Delicate slices of the thinnest, pinkest cold tongue will be the only meat necessary. Anything more would be less genteel, and I am almost certain that Mr. Pettus would exchange the half of a beef's tongue for the other head of early york. Don't you remember, sister Sophia, how much he liked the other two—the ones he took in exchange for the sugar?" Miss Judy chirruped on, with growing enthusiasm. "And Merica could make some of her light rolls, and shape a little pat of butter like a water-lily, and put it in the smallest tin bucket with the tight top and let it down in the well by a string, till it got to be real cool and firm. For dessert we've the tiny jar of pear preserves which we've been saving so long. Nothing could be more delicate than they are, clear as amber, with the little rose-geranium leaf at the bottom of the jar, giving both flavor and perfume, till you can't tell whether it looks prettiest, tastes nicest, or smells sweetest."
Miss Judy's flax-flower eyes, bright with delightful excitement, were fixed on Miss Sophia's face, without seeing, as grosser eyes would have seen, that Miss Sophia's mouth actually watered. There was a momentary silence; and then an uneasy thought suddenly clouded Miss Judy's beaming, blushing countenance.
"I had forgotten about that new-fashioned dish. Of course we must have some of those delicately fried potatoes, some like we had at old lady Gordon's supper; they are cut very, very thin and browned till they are crisp and beautiful—dry and rustling, as the golden leaves of the fall. Yes, I am afraid the tea will not be really complete, will not be quite up to the latest fashion, unless we have a little dish of those. And we haven't any potatoes, except the handful of peach-blows that we have saved for planting." She sighed in perplexity, looking at her sister.
"Just so, sister Judy," responded Miss Sophia, more promptly and more firmly, if possible, than she had yet spoken.
Miss Judy sat for a moment in dejected silence, turning the matter over in her mind. Miss Sophia rocked heavily, the sleepy creak of her low chair mingling pleasantly with the contented murmur of the bees in the honeysuckle.
"Oh!" exclaimed Miss Judy, her face illuminated by a bright inspiration. "How dull of me not to think of it before. Now I see how we can eat the peach-blows and plant them too! We have only to pare them very thin, being very, very careful to leave all the eyes in the peel. Then we can plant the peel and fry the inside."
"But they won't grow," protested poor Miss Sophia, almost groaning and quite desperate, foreseeing the long winter fast which must follow this short summer feast.