"But now we're out of it, and by Heavens and earth we're a-goin' to stay out! There hain't a-goin' to be any more mournin' done in this family--not if I know myself, there hain't." But I sez, "Oren, don't talk so; folks _have_ to mourn; this is a World of trials, and grief is nateral to it." "Wall, I'll mourn in pepper and salt, and I'll mourn out-doors. I hain't a-goin' to wind myself up in crape, and shet myself up in a black hole no more, mourn or not mourn. "And I'm a-goin' to laugh when I want to." And he jest laid his head back and bust out into a horse-laugh at nothin'. But they didn't seem to mind it; I guess they wuz ust to it, and the girls kinder put in and laughed too. Lateza Alzina didn't laugh out loud, but she kinder snickered some. It made me feel queer. I see--I see the truth; the bow had been drawed too tight back, and now it wuz a-goin' to shoot too fur--way over the mark. But still I felt that Oren had some truth on his side. And I sez, "I always felt that you shet yourselves up too much and mourned too deep." "Wall," sez Lateza Alzina, "my folks always brung me up to think that it would be apt to make talk if folks went out any while they wuz in black." "Wall," sez I, "I always felt that folks had better set down and calculate which would be the most agreeable to 'em, to shet themselves up and lose their health, and die, or to let folks talk. "And then act on them thoughts, and do as they want to with fear and tremblin'. "And," sez I, "folks would talk whilst you wuz dyin', anyway; you can't keep folks from talkin'." Sez I, "Like as not they'd say it wuz a guilty conscience that made you droop round and stay to home so." "Wall," sez Lateza Alzina, "I wuz brought up to think that it showed so much respect to them that wuz gone to stay to home in black." "Wall," sez I, "if the ones that wuz gone loved you, they would want you to git all the consolation you could whilst you wuz parted. Jest as a mother lets her child have some picture-books to comfort it while she leaves it a spell. "And if you loved them," sez I, "their memory would go out-doors with you, and go back into the house with you. You would see the beloved face lookin' down at you from every mountain you would climb, and the shadder of their form would seem to appear in the mist of every valley. Every sunset would gleam with the smilin' light of their eyes, and every sunrise would begen to you, tellin' you that one more night had gone, and you wuz so much nearer to the Eternal Reunion. "Folks don't have to stay indoors to remember, Lateza. I have remembered folks out-doors, it seems to me, more than I ever did in the house. "And the voice you loved would seem to be a-tellin' you, 'Keep well, beloved, so you can do some of my day's work I had to lay down, as well as your own, and the meetin' will be all the gladder and more joyous.'