for me, and I looked as pretty as a pink, if I do say it. 'Self-praise goes but a little ways,' my mother used to tell me, when I was a gyirl; but I reckon there ain't any harm in an old woman like me tellin' how she looked when she was a bride more'n sixty years ago." And a faint color came into the wrinkled cheeks, while her clear, high laugh rang out. The outward symbols of youth and beauty were gone, but their unquenchable spirit lay warm under the ashes of nearly eight decades. "Well, I went out, and Abram helped me into the buggy and, instead o' goin' straight on to Goshen church, he turned around and drove out to my church. When we walked in I could see folks nudgin' each other and laughin', and when meetin' broke and we was fixin' to go home, Aunt Maria Taylor grabbed hold o' me and pulled me off to one side and says she, 'That's right, Jane, you're beginnin' in time. Jest break a man in at the start, and you won't have no trouble afterwards.' And I jest laughed in her face and went on to where Abram was waitin' for me. I was too happy to git mad that day. Well, the next Sunday, when we got into the buggy and Abram started to turn round, I took hold o' the reins and says I, 'It's my time to drive, Abram; you had your way last Sunday, and now I'm goin' to have mine.' And I snapped the whip over old Nell's back and drove right on to Goshen, and Abram jest set back and laughed fit to kill. "We went on that way for two or three months, folks sayin' that Abram and Jane Parrish couldn't go to the same church two Sundays straight along to save their lives, and everybody wonderin' which of us'd have their way in the long run. And me and Abram jest laughed in our sleeves and paid no attention to 'em; for there never was but one way for us, anyhow, and that wasn't Abram's way nor my way; it was jest _our_ way. There's lots of married folks, honey, and one of 'em's here and one of 'em's gone over yonder, and there's a long, deep grave between 'em; but they're a heap nearer to each other than two livin' people that stay in the same house, and eat at the same table, and sleep in the same bed, and all the time there's two great thick church walls between 'em and growin' thicker and higher every day. Sam Amos used to say that if religion made folks act like Marthy and Amos did, he believed he'd ruther have less religion or none at all. But, honey, when you see married folks quarrelin' over their churches, it ain't too much religion that's the cause o' the trouble, it's too little love. Jest ricollect that; if folks love each other right, religion ain't goin' to come between 'em.