"Yes; but we must all die--nobody can skip his turn. Does she still talk about them that's gone?"
"They say not. I believe she's sunk into a quiet way; and it looks as if she'd go off easy."
"Sunday is a good day for dying--it's about the only journey that speeds well on this day!"
There was something striking in the outflow of people into the street, that till now had seemed utterly deserted. There was no fevered hurry; no negligent or poorly dressed people. Every family came in groups--old folks and young children; and every member blossomed forth in his best apparel, like a rose-bush in June. Do you know that man in a silk hat and new black coat? Probably it is some stranger. No; it is the carpenter, Mr. Baggs, who was racing about yesterday with his sleeves rolled up, and a dust-and-business look in his face! I knew you would not know him. Adams Gardner, the blacksmith,--does he not look every inch a judge, now that he is clean-washed, shaved, and dressed? His eyes are as bright as the sparks that fly from his anvil!
Are not the folks proud of their children? See what groups of them! How ruddy and plump are most! Some are roguish, and cut clandestine capers at every chance. Others seem like wax figures, so perfectly proper are they. Little hands go slyly through the pickets to pluck a tempting flower. Other hands carry hymn-books or Bibles. But, carry what they may, dressed as each parent can afford, is there anything the sun shines upon more beautiful than these troops of Sunday children?
The old bell had it all its own way up in the steeple. It was the licensed noise of the day. In a long shed behind the church stood a score and half-score of wagons and chaises and carryalls,--the horses already beginning the forenoon's work of stamping and whisking the flies. More were coming. Hiram Beers had "hitched up," and brought two loads with his new hack; and now, having secured the team, he stood with a few admiring young fellows about him, remarking on the people as they came up.
"There's Trowbridge--he'll git asleep afore the first prayer's over. I don't b'lieve he's heerd a sermon in ten years. I've seen him sleep standin' up in singin'.
"Here comes Deacon Marble,--smart old feller, ain't he?--wouldn't think it, jest to look at him! Face looks like an ear of last summer's sweet corn, all dried up; but I tell ye he's got the juice in him yit! Aunt Polly's gittin' old, ain't she? They say she can't walk half the time--lost the use of her limbs; but it's all gone to her tongue. That's as good as a razor, and a sight better 'n mine, for it never needs sharpenin'.
"Stand away, boys, there's 'Biah Cathcart. Good horses--not fast, but mighty strong, just like the owner."
And with that Hiram touched his new Sunday hat to Mrs. Cathcart and Alice; and as he took the horses by the bits, he dropped his head and gave the Cathcart boys a look of such awful solemnity, all except one eye, that they lost their sobriety. Barton alone remained sober as a judge.