No one could deny that the house was pretty, and comfortable too, when at last the carpenter and painter had done their work, and the curtains and the easy-chairs and the bookshelves had taken their places, and the great fire of pine logs was lighted, and the mocking-bird's song streamed in with the sunlight through the open door and between the fluttering leaves of the ivy-screen at the window. The piano was always open in the evenings, with Merry or the Pessimist strumming on the keys or trying some of the lovely new songs; and Hope would be busy at her table with farm-books and accounts; and the Invalid, in his easy-chair, would be listening to the music and falling off to sleep and rousing himself with a little clucking snore to pile more lightwood on the fire; and the mocking-bird in his covered cage would wake too and join lustily in the song, till Merry smothered him up in thicker coverings.
The first duty was evident. "Give it a name, I beg," Merry had said the very first evening in the new home; and the house immediately went into committee of the whole to decide upon one. Hope proposed Paradise Plantation; Merry suggested Fortune Grove; the Pessimist hinted that Folly Farm would be appropriate, but this proposition was ignominiously rejected; and the Invalid gave the casting-vote for Hope's selection.
"I'SE DE SECTION, SAH."
The hour for work having now arrived, the man was not slow in presenting himself. "I met an old fellow who used to be a sort of overseer on this very plantation," the Invalid said. "He says he has an excellent horse, and you will need one, Hope. I told him to come and see you."
"Which? the man or the horse?" asked Merry in a low voice.
"Both, apparently," answered the Pessimist in the same tone, "for here they come."
"Ole man Spafford," as he announced himself, was a darkey of ancient and venerable mien, tall, gaunt and weatherbeaten. His steed was taller, gaunter and apparently twice as old—an interesting study for the osteologist if there be any such scientific person.
"He splendid saddle-hoss, missis," said the old man: "good wuk-hoss too—bery fine hoss."
"It seems to me he's rather thin," said Hope doubtfully.