“Ah, have you?” cried the minister. “I hope you found your people all well? How is the place looking? I suppose the season isn't quite so advanced as it is with us.”
“There's some snow in the woods yet,” said Lemuel, laying the stick he carried across the hat-brim on his knees. “Mother was well; but my sister and her husband have had a good deal of sickness.”
“Oh, I'm sorry for that,” said Sewell, with the general sympathy which Evans accused him of keeping on tap professionally. “Well, how did you like the looks of Willoughby Pastures compared with Boston? Rather quieter, I suppose.”
“Yes, it was quieter,” answered Lemuel.
“But the first touch of spring must be very lovely there! I find myself very impatient with these sweet, early days in town. I envy you your escape to such a place.”
Lemuel opposed a cold silence to the lurking didacticism of these sentences, and Sewell hastened to add, “And I wish I could have had your experience in contrasting the country and the town, after your long sojourn here, on your first return home. Such a chance can come but once in a lifetime, and to very few.”
“There are some pleasant things about the country,” Lemuel began.
“Oh, I am sure of it!” cried Sewell, with cheerful aimlessness.
“The stillness was a kind of rest, after the noise here; I think any one might be glad to get back to such a place——”
“I was sure you would,” interrupted Sewell.