great tumult in the kitchen, pans kicked about, tongs falling, dishes rattling, and table shoved over the floor, something pretty good, in the shape either of a bonne-bouche or a bon-mot, is sure to turn up.
This morning there was a furious hubbub, that threatened to drown my voice. Saide was evidently "flyin' roun'," and Kate, who could not hear half that I read, got out of patience.
"What is the matter?" she asked, raising the sash of the window.
"I on'y wants the currender, (colander,) Miss Catline,—dat's all, Miss."
"Well, does it take a whirlwind to produce it?"
"Oh, laws, Miss Catline! Don't be dat funny now, don't!—yegh! yegh!— I'se find it presentry. I'se on'y a little frustrated, (flustered,) Miss, with de 'fusion, and I'se jes a-studyin'. Never mind me, Miss,—dat's all, indeed it is,—and you'll have a fuss-rate minch-pie for dinner. I guess so, too!—yegh! yegh!"—And so we had.
Kate's domestics stand in much awe of her, but feel at least equal love. So that hers is a household kept in good order, with very little of the vexation, annoyance, and care, I hear so many of her married friends groaning about.
April.
For a month nearly, Kate has forbidden my writing, and the first part of this letter was not sent; so I will finish it now. My sister thought the effort of holding a pen, in my recumbent position, was too wearying to me; but now I am stronger, and can sit up supported by pillows. I hasten to tell you of another most important addition to my comfort, which has been made since I wrote last. I am so eager with the news, that I can hardly hold a steady pen. Isn't this a fine state for a promising young lawyer to be reduced to? He is wild with excitement, because some one has given him a new go-cart!
Ben, the gardener, was that indulgent individual. He made for me, with his own industrious hands, what he calls a "jaunting-car-r-r-r." It is a large wheeled couch on springs. I am a house-prisoner no longer!
I think the first ride I took in it was the most exciting event of my life. I was not exactly conscious of being mortally tired of looking from the same porch, over the same garden, into the same grove, and up to the same quarter of the heavens, for so many months; but when the change came unexpectedly, it was transporting happiness.
I suppose it may be so when we enter a future life. While here, we think we do not want to go elsewhere,—even to a better land; but when we reach that shore, we shall probably acknowledge it to be a lucky change.
Ben drew me carefully down the garden-path. I inhaled the breath of the tulips and hyacinths, as we passed them. I longed to stay there in that fairy land, for they brought back all the unspeakably rapturous feelings of my boyhood. Strange that such delight, after we become men, never visits us except in moments brief as lightning-flashes,-and then generally only as a memory,—not, as when we were children, in the form of a hope! When we are boys, and sudden joy stirs our hearts, we say, "Oh, how grand life will be!" When we are men, and are thus moved, it is, "Ah, how bright life was!"
Ben did not pause in the hyacinth-bed with me. He was anxious to prove the excellence of his vehicle; so he dragged me on in it, until we had nearly reached the boundary of our grounds, where the two tall, ragged old cedar-trees marked the extreme point of the evergreen shrubbery, and the view of the neighborhood lies before us. He stopped there and said,—
"Ye'll mappen like to look abroad a bit, and I'se go on to the post-office. Miss Kathleen bid me put you here fornenst the landskip, and then leave ye. She was greatly fashed at the coompany cooming just then. I must go, Sir."
"All right, Ben. You need not hurry."
