“‘Well, then, there’s t’other’--taking the second candlestick out of his pocket, and adding, ‘and here’s a fol-de-rol for you to tie round your neck.’” It is not difficult to see that when the young _James_ wishes to get into the good graces of this prickly old gentleman he will have a hard time. _Uncle Tim_ did not “‘see why the boys need to be all the time a-coming to see Grace, for she was nothing extraordinary after all.’” In this opinion _Master James_ did not at all concur; he thought _Grace_ the most wonderful girl in the world, and he had an idea in regard to her that he was determined to carry out. Moreover, he was of the joyous, buoyant variety of youth who cannot see why their plans should fail. We understand perfectly who stood as model for this earnest, clean, optimistic, merry-hearted young man. Harriet could not have had any one in her mind but the brother that she had so loved and worshiped ever since the days when she led him by the hand down to the Dame School. “‘Why, James,’ said his companion and chief counselor, ‘do you think Grace likes you?’ “‘I don’t know,’ said our hero with a comfortable appearance of certainty. “‘But you can’t get her, James, if Uncle Tim is cross about it.’ “‘Fudge! I can make Uncle Tim like me if I have a mind to try.’ “‘Well, then, Jim, you’ll have to give up that flute of yours, I tell you, now.’ “‘Fa, sol, la--I can make him like me, and my flute, too.’ “‘Why, how will you work it?’ “‘Oh, I’ll work it,’ said our hero. “‘Well, Jim, I tell you now, you don’t know Uncle Tim if you say so, for he’s just the settest critter in his way that you ever saw.’ “‘I _do_ know Uncle Tim though, better than most folks; he is no more cross than I am; and as to his being _set_, you have nothing to do but make him think he is in his own way when he is in yours--that is all.’ “‘Well,’ said the other, ‘but you see I don’t believe it.’ “‘And I’ll bet you a gray squirrel that I’ll go there this very evening, and get him to like me and my flute both,’ said James.” It is needless to say that the clever _Jim_ carried this out to the letter. He went there that evening; he drove _Uncle Tim’s_ sheep out of the garden, praised the old man’s bell-flower apples, told stories at the table, proved that it was not irreverent to use the flute even in church, and made _Uncle Tim_ admit it; in short he made himself here, as everywhere, the great favorite. The story turns out as it should, and the Uncle is filled with joy at the outcome. This was the substance of the first real story that Harriet Beecher wrote. It was a simple little story, but it gave promise of the abilities that she later showed not only in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” but in the long series of even more artistic, if not more influential, works in which she has enshrined for us the fading memories of old New England traditions and customs.