"The evenings here must seem like something holy," said Mrs. Clifford, "'the nun-like evenings, telling dew-beads as they go.'"
"O, my shole!" cried Katie, dancing before the church door, and clapping her hands; "that's the bear's house, the bear's house! Little boy went in there, drank some of the old bear's podge, so sour he couldn't drink it." Here she looked disgusted, but added with a honeyed smile, "Then bimeby drank some o' little bear's podge, and 'twas so sweet he drank it aw—all up!"
Everybody laughed, it was so absurd to think of looking for bears and porridge in a building where people met to worship. Dotty had just been saying to herself, "How strange that God is in this mizzable house out West, just as if it was in Portland!" But Katie had rudely broken in upon her meditations.
"O, what a Flyaway!" said she; "you don't do any good."
"Yes, I does."
"Well, what?"
"O, I tell 'tories."
"Is that all?"
"I p'ay with little goorls; and then I p'ay some more; and I wash de dishes. I'll tell you a 'tory," added she, balancing herself on a stump, and making wild gestures with her arms, somewhat as she had seen Horace do.
"'Woe to de Dotties and sons 'o men,