98 THE TIM BUNKEK PAPERS. 



an air of triumph upon the face of Mrs. Deacon Smith, as 

 we sat down to dinner, as much as to say, &quot; Now we shall 

 see what it is to have a daughter educated at a fashionable 

 French boarding school, and keep house in style.&quot; There 

 was considerable unction about Mr. Spooner s grace before 

 meat, as if he had got it up for the occasion. The com 

 pany were in the best of spirits, and Dr. Sturgis was slic 

 ing away at the turkey s breast, when attention was sud 

 denly arrested by sundry corn, oats, and buckwheat, slip 

 ping out of the undressed crop of the fowl. The women 

 folks at that end of the table put their handkerchiefs to 

 their noses, as if they had got wind of something that did 

 not smell like thje roses on the bottoms of their plates. 

 Mrs. Deacon Smith fidgeted about in her chair, as if she 

 was on pins. Eliza looked as crimson as a beet, clear to 

 the roots of her hair. The Deacon was at the other end 

 of the table, very busy discussing the last sermon or elec 

 tion with Mr. Spoon er, and did not see the trouble. Our 

 Sally looked wicked, and winked across the table to Jo- 

 siah, and there was a twitching about Josiah s mouth, that 

 I should say was wicked also, if he was not a minister. 

 Dr. Sturgis got over the matter nicely, by remarking upon 

 the undone condition of the turkey, and calling a servant 

 to remove the dish. Fidelity to truth, I suppose, did not 

 require him to tell whether the rawness pertained to the 

 cooking, or the dressing of the fowl, or the housekeeper, 

 that lay back of both. Fortunately a liberal allowance 

 had been made for the dinner, and the boiled fowls, pur 

 chased of a farmer who married a housekeeper as well as 

 a woman, did duty for the roast turkey cooked with his 

 crop in. 



Now I suppose a good many of your readers among 

 women folks will hold up both their hands in astonish 

 ment, at my standard of a good housewife. I say it is a 

 shame and a disgrace for an American woman not to 

 know how to do every thing that is done, or ought to be 



