CLOVERNOOK. 



She had a changeable silk, yellow and blue, made with a surplus front; and when 

 she wore that, the ground wasn't good enough for her to walk on, so some folks used to 

 say; but I never thought Sally was bit prouder lifted up; and if anybody was sick, there 

 was no better-hearted creature than she; and then, she was always good-natured as the 

 day was long, and would sing all the time at her work. I remember, along before she 

 was married, she used to sing one song a great deal, beginning 



'I've got a sweelliearl willi briglil black eyes;' 



and they said she meant William McMicken by that, and that she might not get him after 

 all— for a good many thought they would never make a match, their dispositions were so 

 contrary. William was of a dreadful quiet turn, and a great home body; and as for being 

 rich, he had nothing to brag of, though he was high larnt, and fjllowed the river as dark 

 sometimes." 



Mrs. Hill had by this time prepared her currants, and Mrs. Troost paused from her 

 story while she filled the kettle, and attached the towel to the end of the well-sweep, where 

 it waved as a signal for Peter to come to supper. 



" Now, just move your chair a leetle nearer to the kitchen door if you please," said Mrs. 

 Hill, " and I can make up my biscuit, and hear you too." 



Meantime, coming to the door with some bread-crumbs in her hand, she began scat- 

 tering them on the ground, and calling, " Biddy, biddy, biddy — chicky, chicky, chicky" 

 — hearing which, a whole flock of poultry was about her in a minute; and stooping down, 

 she secured one of the fattest, which, an hour afterwards, was broiled for supper. 



" Dear me, how easily you do get along!" said Mrs. Troost. 



And it was sometime before she could compose herself sufficiently to take up the 

 thread of her story. At length, however, she began with — 



" Well, as I was saying, nobody thought William McMicken would marry Sally May. 

 Poor man, they say he is not like himself any more. He may get a dozen wives, but he'll 

 never get another Sally. A good wife she made him, for all she was such a wild girl. 



" The old man May was opposed to the marriage, and threatened to turn Sally, his 

 own daughter, out of house and home; but she was headstrong, and would marry whom 

 she pleased; and so she did, though she never got a stitch of new clothes, nor one thing 

 to keep hou.se with. No; not one single thing did her father give her when she went away, 

 but a hive of bees. He was right down ugly, and called her Mrs. McMicken, whenever he 

 spoke to her after she was married; but Sally did'nt seem to mind it, and took just as 

 good care of the bees as though they were Avorth a thousand dollars. Every day in win- 

 ter she used to feed them — maple-sugar, if she had it; and if not, a little Muscovade in a 

 saucer or some old broken dish. 



" But it happened one day that a bee stung her on the hand — the right one, I think it 

 was — and Sally said right away that it was a bad sign; and that very night she dreamed 

 that she went out to feed her bees, and a piece of black crape was tied on the hive. She 

 felt that it was a token of death, and told her husband so, and she told me and Mrs. 

 Hanks. No, I won't be sure she told Mrs. Hanks, but Mrs. Hanks got to hear it some 

 way." 



" Well," said Mrs. Hill, wiping the tears away with herapron, "I really didn'tknow, 

 till now, that poor Mrs. McMicken was dead." 



" Oh, she is not dead," answered Mrs. Troost, " but as well as she ever was, only she 

 feels that she is not long for this world." The painful interest of her story, however, had 

 her from work, so the afternoon passed without her having accomplished much — she 

 never could work when she went visiting; 



