Within the kitchen another woman was stepping about actively, and now and then cast an unsatisfied look at the doorway. Finally came to a stop in the middle of the floor to speak. "What are you sittin' there for, Diana?" "Nothing, that I know of." "If I was sittin' there for nothin', seems to me I'd get up and go somewheres else." "Where?" said the beauty languidly. "Anywhere. Goodness! it makes me feel as if nothin' would ever get done, to see you sittin' there so." "It's all done, mother." "What?" "Everything." "Have you got out the pink china?" "Yes." "Is your cake made?" "Yes, mother; you saw me do it." "I didn't see you bakin' it, though." "Well, it is done." "Did it raise light and puffy?" "Beautiful." "And didn't get burned?" "Only the least bit, in the corner. No harm." "Have you cut the cheese and shivered the beef?" "All done." "Then I think you had better go and dress yourself." "There's plenty of time. Nobody can be here for two hours yet." "I wouldn't sit and do nothin', if I was you." "Why not, mother? when there is really nothing to do." "I don't believe in no such minutes, for my part. They never come to me. Look at what I've done to-day, now. There was first the lighting the fire and getting breakfast. Then I washed up, and righted the kitchen and set on the dinner. Then I churned and brought the butter and worked _that_. Then there was the dairy things. Then I've been in the garden and picked four quarts of ifs-and-ons for pickles; got 'em all down in brine, too. Then I made out my bread, and made biscuits for tea, and got dinner, and eat it, and cleared it away, and boiled a ham." "Not since dinner, mother?" "Took it out, and that; and got all my pots and kettles put away; and picked over all that lot o' berries, I think I'd make preserves of 'em, Diana; when folks come to sewing meeting for the missionaries they needn't have all creation to eat, seems to me. They don't sew no better for it. _I_ believe in fasting, once in a while." "What for?" "What for? Why, to keep down people's stomach; take off a slice of their pride." "Mother! do you think eating and people's pride have anything to do with each other?" "I guess I do! I tell you, fasting is as good as whipping to take down a child's stomach; let 'em get real thin and empty, and they'll come down and be as meek as Moses. Folks ain't different from children." "You never tried that with me, mother," said Diana, half laughing. "Your father always let you have your own way. I could ha' managed _you_, I guess; but your father and you was too much at once. Come, Diana do--get up and go off and get dressed, or something." But she sat still, letting the soft June air woo her, and the scents of flower and field hold some subtle communion with her. There was a certain hidden harmony between her and them; and yet they stirred her somehow uneasily. "I wonder," she said after a few minutes' silence, "what a nobleman's park is like?"