"To give milk, indeed!" said Uncle Jacob, in a tone as if Miss Hannah had said the cow was good to read aloud or to calculate the longitude. "As if you wanted a cow to give milk! Why, you can't use more than a quart a day at the outside, and what becomes of the rest, I want to know? I don't hear of your selling any." Aunt Hannah did not seem to feel obliged to gratify her brother's curiosity, for she remained silent. "Umph!" said Rhoda to herself. "Perhaps if he should ask Widow Makay and poor old Aunty Sarah, they might tell him something about the milk; though I don't exactly see what business it is of his." But Uncle Jacob was continuing his lecture: "The fact is, Hannah, you are no manager at all; you don't know how to save. The right way would be for you to break up housekeeping and board somewhere, for two or three dollars a week, fat and kill that old cow, and rent your house and land. Then it would bring you in a good, handsome sum, whereas now you don't get your living out of it; and you might lay up money every year. Why, you might die a rich woman if you would only be guided by me and take care of things." "Possibly, Jacob, but I prefer living a rich woman," said Aunt Hannah. "I have enough as it is to make me very comfortable, and to help others a little, and I don't exactly see what good it would do me to die rich, unless I could take my money along with me, which does not seem very practicable. I like to have my own house over my head and my own land around me; and as I have nobody dependent upon me, I don't see that I have any particular motive for saving more money than will serve to take care of me if I should be long sick, and bury me when I am dead; and that I have done already. So you see I feel quite easy on that score." "You might think of somebody besides yourself," said Uncle Jacob. "There is that boy of John Bowers's." "Oh, he is likely to be well enough off," said Aunt Hannah. "If I were to save, it would not be for the boy, but for the girl." "The girl is no relation to you, or them either," growled Mr. Weightman. "She has never done work enough to pay for her board, and she never will. It has all been a piece of nonsense from the taking of her in the first place to the present time. They ought to have taught her to work, and kept her at it, instead of sending her to school and dressing her up as fine as a lady. Why, Mr. Shepherd's bound-girl does more than half the work, and she is only twelve years old. Mrs. Shepherd says she can do quite a large washing now." Boiling over with indignation, Rhoda jumped up and came into the kitchen, knocking down a pail as she did so and making a tremendous clatter. As she was picking it up, Aunt Hannah opened the inner door: "Are you there, child. I thought I heard somebody come in a while ago. Have you been sitting here all the time?" "Yes," said Rhoda. "Aunt Hannah, I didn't mean to listen, but I could not help hearing." "Never mind, dear; there is no harm done."