to his capacious jaws, she exclaimed: "Why, what on yarth _is_ the matter with you, Isaac, that you keep a grinning, and grinning, and fidgetting about all to yourself so much like a plaguy nateral born fool for?" So loudly, suddenly and unexpectedly was this question put--for all had been silent some minutes previous--that Isaac started, blushed, dropped the bread--already near enough to his teeth to have felt uncomfortable, had it been capable of feeling--endeavored to catch it--blundered--and finally upset his plate and contents into his lap, in a manner so truly ridiculous, that Ella and Mrs. Younker, unable to restrain their mirth, laughed heartily, while the stranger and Algernon smiled, and the stern features of the father relaxed into an expression of quiet humor seldom seen on his countenance. "'Pon my word," continued Mrs. Younker, so soon as she could collect breath enough after laughing to go on; "I do raley believe as how the boy's ayther crazy, or in love, for sartin. What does ail ye, Isaac?--do tell!" "Perhaps he was thinking of his dear Peggy," said Ella, archly; who was, by the way, very fond of teasing him whenever opportunity presented; and could not even now, despite her previous low spirits, forbear a little innocent raillery--her temperament being such, that wit and humor were ever ready on the slightest provocation to take the ascendancy, as old wine when stirred ever sends its sparkling beads upward. "I wonder, Isaac, if you looked as amiable and interesting in the eyes of dear Peggy, and made as graceful an appearance, when you popped the question?" "Why, how in the name o' all Christen nater did you find out I'd done it?" asked Isaac, in reply; who having, meantime, regained his former position, and restored the plate, minus some of its contents, now sat a perfect picture of comical surprise, with his mouth slightly ajar, and his small eyes strained to their utmost and fastened seriously upon the querist as he awaited her answer. "Murder will out, dear Isaac," replied Ella, with a ringing laugh; in which she was joined by most of the others; and particularly by the subject of the joke; who perceiving, too late for retreat, that he had been betrayed into an acknowledgment of his secret, deemed this his wisest course for defence. "And so, Isaac, you have really proposed to darling Peggy, then? and we are to have a wedding shortly?" continued his tormentor. "And pray which did look the most foolish of the two?--or was it a drawn-game, as we sometimes say of draughts?"