THE STORE, 
469 
It is amusing once in a while to look on as the different cus- 
tomers come and go. Some people like shopping in a large town, 
where all sorts of pretty novelties are spread out on the counters 
to tempt purchasers ; but there is much more real interest con- 
nected with such matters in a large country store, whatever fine 
ladies tossing about laces and gauzes at Beck's or Stewart's may 
fancy. The country people come into the village not to shop, but 
to trade ; their purchases are all a matter of positive importance 
to them, they are all made with due forethought and dehberation. 
Most Saturdays of the year one meets farm-wagons, or lumber- 
sleighs, according to the season, coming into the village, filled 
with family parties — and it may be a friend or two besides — two 
and three seats crowded with grown people, and often several 
merry-faced little ones sitting in the straw. They generall}^ 
make a day of it, the men having, perhaps, some business to 
look after, the women some friends to hunt up, besides purchases 
to be made and their own produce to be disposed of, for they 
commonly bring with them something of this kind ; eggs or but- 
ter, maple-sugar or molasses, feathers, yarn, or homespun cloths 
and flannels. At an early hour on pleasant Saturdays, summer 
or winter, the principal street shows many such customers, being 
lined Avith their wagons or sleighs ; in fact, it is a sort of mar- 
ket-day. It is pleasing to* see these family parties making their 
purchases. Sometimes it is a mother exchanging the fruits of 
her own labors for a gay print to make frocks for the eager, earn- 
est-looking little girls by her side ; often the husband stands by 
holding a baby — one always likes to see a man carrying the baby 
~ it is a kind act — while the wife makes her choice of teacups or 
brooms ; now we have two female friends, country neighbors, 
