She lifted a royal head,
Standing straight, as a tree;
While troops of little ones clustered and clung
To raiment and hand and knee.
"Should I not be glad," said she,
"In health and beauty and joy like this?
Babies by hundreds to cuddle and kiss;
A happier town was never sung;
A heaven of children for old and young;
There is only one that is dead—
It was only mine," she said.
THE BOYS AND THE BUTTER
Young Holdfast and J. Edwards Fernald sat grimly at their father's table, being seen and not heard, and eating what was set before them, asking no questions for conscience' sake, as they had been duly reared. But in their hearts were most unchristian feelings toward a venerable guest, their mother's aunt, by name Miss Jane McCoy.
They knew, with the keen observation of childhood, that it was only a sense of hospitality, and duty to a relative, which made their father and mother polite to her—polite, but not cordial.
Mr. Fernald, as a professed Christian, did his best to love his wife's aunt, who came as near being an "enemy" as anyone he knew. But Mahala, his wife, was of a less saintly nature, and made no pretense of more than decent courtesy.
"I don't like her and I won't pretend to; it's not honest!" she protested to her husband, when he remonstrated with her upon her want of natural affection. "I can't help her being my aunt—we are not commanded to honor our aunts and uncles, Jonathan E."
Mrs. Fernald's honesty was of an iron hardness and heroic mould. She would have died rather than have told a lie, and classed as lies any form of evasion, deceit, concealment or even artistic exaggeration.
Her two sons, thus starkly reared, found their only imaginative license in secret converse between themselves, sacredly guarded by a pact of mutual faith, which was stronger than any outward compulsion. They kicked each other under the table, while enduring this visitation, exchanged dark glances concerning the object of their common dislike, and discussed her personal peculiarities with caustic comment later, when they should have been asleep.
Miss McCoy was not an endearing old lady. She was heavily built, and gobbled her food, carefully selecting the best. Her clothing was elaborate, but not beautiful, and on close approach aroused a suspicion of deferred laundry bills.
Among many causes for dislike for her aunt, Mrs. Fernald cherished this point especially. On one of these unwelcome visits she had been at some pains to carry up hot water for the Saturday evening bath, which was all the New England conscience of those days exacted, and the old lady had neglected it not only once but twice.