Later, he sat under the wayside oak and communed with himself. How did he account for that? he asked. Honest, now, wouldn't it gave you a pain? Here he was, the Lord's boy, a professin' Christian, belongin' to every church they was, he expected, startin' out all so gay to do the Lord's work, and Him knowledgeable to it, and helpin' along; and then all in a minute some part of him--something he couldn't get a holt of--give a jump, and _wanted_ them things, wanted 'em like--Gorry to 'Liza! You couldn't have no idea _how_ he wanted 'em! and yet 'twasn't him, neither: all the time he was lookin' on, you might say, struck all of a heap. Now how would you make that out? Honest, how would you? After some thought, Pippin expected that it was the devil. He was always round, you know, like a roarin' line, seekin' whom he could devour 'em up. Behooved him keep a sharp lookout! _But_, said another part of his brain, ekally the Lord was round, and more so, let him bear in mind. The Lord was mindful of His own; Elder Hadley had wrote that in the Testament and Psalms he give him, and 'twas _so_; and the Lord was stronger than the devil, never let Pippin have no doubts about that. "You bet He is!" Up went Pippin's head; he smote his knee with a resounding smack. "You bet He is! Satan, you beat it while your shoes are new! I've got no more use for you, and don't you forget it!" CHAPTER XIII ENTER MARY-IN-THE-KITCHEN In a certain pleasant suburb--yes, the city has pleasant suburbs, though when you are in the slums you do not believe it--stands a white house with green blinds. It stands in the middle of a square yard (by which I mean an inclosure, not a measure of space); its front looks on a pleasant street, with a sidewalk, and sentinel maples set at regular intervals; the back gives, as the French say, on a road that is not yet paved, with neither sidewalk nor maples, only a straggling procession of elms, with grass or dust, as may happen, under foot. Yet it is more sympathetic, some people think, than the proper street, and Mary-in-the-kitchen, whose windows both above and below stairs look out upon it, privately thinks she has the best part of the house. So thinks the visitor in the back corner room, too; but we have not come to him yet.