"Good lack!" exclaimed Tabitha, in a tone which was a mixture of amusement and annoyance. "Did the child think I cared nought about her, forsooth?" "O Aunt Tabitha, do you?" demanded Christie, in a voice of innocent astonishment. "I am so glad. Look you, whenever you come, you always find fault with me for something, so I thought you didn't." "Bless the babe! Dost think I should take all that trouble to amend thee, if I loved thee not?" "Well, perhaps--" said Christie hesitatingly. "But Aunt Alice always tried to mend me, and so does Father: but somehow they don't do it like you, Aunt Tabitha." "They're both a deal too soft and sleek with thee," growled Aunt Tabitha. "There's nought 'll mend a child like a good rattling scolding, without 'tis a thrashing, and thou never hast neither." "Art avised [are you sure] o' that, Tabitha?" asked Roger. "God sends not all His rain in thunderstorms." "Mayhap not; but He does send thunderstorms, and earthquakes too," returned Tabitha triumphantly. "I grant you; but the thunderstorms are rare, and the earthquakes yet rarer; and the soft dew cometh every night. And 'tis the dew and the still small rain, not the earthquakes, that maketh the trees and flowers to grow." "Ah, well, you're mighty wise, I cast no doubt," answered Tabitha, getting up to go home. "But I tell you I was well thrashed, and scolded to boot, and it made a woman of me." "I suppose, Father," said Christie, when Tabitha had taken her departure, "that the scolding and beating did make a woman of Aunt Tabitha; but please don't be angry if I say that it wasn't as pleasant a woman as Aunt Alice." CHAPTER TWENTY SIX. "A RUCK OF TROUBLE." "Well, be sure! if there ever was a woman in such a ruck of trouble!" said poor Collet Pardue, wiping her eyes. "Here's my man took to prison, saints knows what for--my man 'at was as quiet as ever a mouse, and as good to me as if he'd ha' been a cherubim, and me left with all them childre--six lads and four lasses--eight o' my own, and two of poor Sens's--and the lads that mischievous as I scarce knows whether I'm on my head or my heels one half o' the day! Here's that Silas a-been and took and dropped the bucket down the well, and never a drop o' water can we get. And Aphabell he's left the gate open, and nine out o' my fourteen chicken strayed away. And I sent Toby for a loaf o' biscuit-bread, a-thinking it'd be a treat for the little uns, and me not having a mite o' time to make it--and if the rogue hasn't been and ate it all up a-coming home--there's the crumbs on his jacket this minute!" "I didn't!" shouted Tobias resentfully, in answer to this unjust accusation. "I didn't eat it all up! I gave half on it to Esdras--a good half." The last words were uttered in a tone of conscious virtue, the young gentleman evidently feeling that his self-denial was not meeting its due reward.