"'Very well, Marthy Nudd; if you've got Isril into heaven and got four hundred dollars life insurance on him, that's the best piece of work ever you done in your life, or ever will do. Cat's foot!' she says; 'folderol!' she says, 'don't talk to me!' and she shoved her out with her stick and wouldn't hear another word. Gorry! I wouldn't ben Marthy Nudd--" "Didn't hurt Marthy none, I expect," said Ebenezer Hoppin. "She's one of them kind, sorter betwixt putty and Injia rubber; you can double her up easy, but first thing you know she's out smooth again. Some say she's liable to marry Elihu Wick, over to the Corner. She'd find him some different from Isril." "What kind of feller is he?" asked Jordan Tooke. "Oh, a string and shingle man. Give him pork and give him sunset, and he won't ask nothin' more. Marthy won't get no four hundred dollars insurance on him, but he'll go to heaven all right. There isn't a mite o' harm in 'Lihu, and Marthy has earned her rest, I will say." "Speakin' of insurance," said Salem, slowly, "reminds me we ain't said anything about Mis' Tree's will. It is a sing'lar will, boys." There was a moment's pause. Heads were shaken and feet were shuffled uneasily. "Mighty sing'lar," said Hiram Gray. "Beats all I ever heard of," said Jordan Tooke. Seth Weaver kept a loyal silence. Salem gave him a look, and, receiving a nod in reply, went on: "Seth and myself was talkin' it over as we came along, kinder takin' our bearin's, and this is the way it looks to us. Mis' Tree was born in this village, and lived in it a hundred and two years, and died in it; and her folks, the Trees and the Darracotts, have lived and died here since there was a village to die in. Not one of them hundred 'n' two years--since she was of knowledgeable age,--but she was doin' good--in her own way--from the first day of January to the last day of December. Not one of us sittin' here on this piazzy but she's done good _to_, one way or another. Therefore and thereon-account of--" Salem was obviously and justifiably proud of this phrase, and repeated it with evident enjoyment; "therefore and thereon-account of, I say, and Seth says with me, that if Mis' Tree wanted this village should be called Cat's-foot, or Fiddlesticks, or Folderol, or Fudge, I for one and he for another would give our votes to have it so called." A confusion of tongues ensued, some agreeing, some protesting, but, while the discussion was at its height, the stage drove up and the day's session was over. CHAPTER III. WHAT THE WOMEN SAID