COUSIN PHILLIS. 17
she was, but somehow I wanted to talk of her, and did not know how to begin.
"Yes — Phillis Holman. She is our only child — now."
Either from that "now," or from a strange momentary wistfulness in her eyes, I knew that there had been more children, who were now dead.
"How old is cousin Phillis?" said I, scarcely venturing on the new name, it seemed too prettily familiar for me to call her by it; but cousin Holman took no notice of it, answering straight to the purpose.
"Seventeen last May-day; but the minister does not like to hear me calling it May-day," said she, checking herself with a little awe." Phillis was seventeen on the first day of May last," she repeated in an emended edition.
"And I am nineteen in another month," thought I, to myself; I don't know why.
Then Phillis came in, carrying a tray with wine and cake upon it.
"We keep a house-servant," said cousin Holman, "but it is churning day, and she is busy." It was meant as a little proud apology for her daughter's being the handmaiden.
"I like doing it, mother," said Phillis, in her grave, full voice.
I felt as if I were somebody in the Old Testament — who, I could not recollect — being served and waited upon by the daughter of the host. Was I like Abraham's steward, when Rebekah gave him to drink at the well? I thought Isaac had not gone the pleasantest way to work in winning him a wife. But Phillis never thought
