And to do him justice he did marry her in a week’s time, and they moved into a little thatched cabin at the bottom of the grounds. Dan wuz good-natered, as I said, and a good coachman and gardener when he chose to work; and Maggie and I took solid happiness in fittin’ up the little rooms so they looked quite pleasant and homelike. Rosy, as her little baby grew and thrived, manifested a degree of love for it that wuz surprisin’ when one took into consideration the utter barrenness and poverty of the soil in which the sweet plant of affection grew. And it actually seemed as if the love she had for the child awakened a soul in her. Frivolous and empty-headed enough she wuz to be sure, but still there wuz an improvement in her datin’ from the hour when her baby first became a delight to her. Dan too grew more settled in his behavior. His drinkin’ spells, which he had always had periodically, grew further and further apart, and with the dignity of a father and householder added to him, it seemed to add cubits to his moral stature. Ignorant enough, and careless and onthinkin’ enough, Heaven knows, but still there wuz a change for the better. Little Snow, sweet angel that she wuz, never tired of flittin’ down the pleasant path bordered with glossy-leaved oleanders and magnolias, to the little whitewashed cottage, to carry dainties to Rosy sent by Maggie, and to baby Dan when he got large enough to comprehend her kindness. And it wuz a pretty sight to see Snow’s rose-sweet face and golden curls nestlin’ down by baby Dan’s little ebony countenance. [Illustration: “YOU CAN REPAIR YOUR DWELLIN’ HOUSE.”] CHAPTER VIII. HOW true it is that though you may move the body round from place to place, you can’t move round or move away from the emotions of the soul that are firm and stabled. You can change your climate, you can repair your dwellin’ house, you can fill your teeth and color your hair, but you can’t make a ardent, enthusiastic man into a sedate and stiddy one, or chain down a ambitious one and make him forget his goles. Now, Josiah Allen had been happy as a king ever sence he had come South to our son’s beautiful home. He had seemed to enjoy the change of scene, the balmy climate, and the freedom from care and labor. But that very freedom from toil, that very onbroken repose wuz what give him and me a sore trial, as you can see by the incident I will tell and recapitulate to you. You see, Josiah Allen, not havin’ any of his usual work to do, and not bein’ any hand to sew on fine sewin’, or knit tattin’, or embroider tidies and splashers, etc., he read a sight—read from mornin’ till night almost. And with his ardent, enthusiastic nater he got led off “by many windy doctrines,” as the text reads. He would be rampant as rampant could be on first one thing and then another—on the tariff, the silver bill, and silo’s, and air ships, etc., etc.