Dabney noticed, too, before they left the place, that all the customary farm-work was going ahead with even more regularity and energy than if the owner himself had been present. "Ham's farm'll look like ours, one of these days, at this rate," he said to his mother. "I mean it shall," she replied, somewhat sharply. "Now go and get out the ponies, and we'll do the rest of our errands." If they had only known it, at that very moment Ham and his blooming bride were setting out for a drive at the fashionable watering-place where they had made the first stop in their wedding tour. "Ham?" said Miranda, "it seems to me as if we were a thousand miles from home." "We shall be further before we get nearer," said Ham. "But I wonder what they are doing there,--mother and the girls and dear little Dabney?" "Little Dabney!" exclaimed Ham. "Why, Miranda, do you think Dab is a baby yet?" "No, not a baby. But------" "Well, he's a boy, that's a fact; but he'll be as tall as I am in three years." "Will he ever be fat?" "Not till after he gets his full length," said Ham. "We must have him at our house a good deal, and feed him up. I've taken a liking to Dab." "Feed him up!" said Miranda, with some indignation. "Do you think we starve him?" "No; but how many meals a day does he get?" "Three, of course, like the rest of us; and he never misses one of them." "I suppose not," said Ham, "I never miss a meal myself, if I can help it. But don't you think three meals a day is rather short allowance for a boy like Dab?" Miranda thought a moment, but then she answered, positively: "No, I don't. Not if he does as well at each one of them as Dab is sure to." "Well," said Ham, "that was in his old clothes, that were too tight for him. Now he's got a good loose fit, with plenty of room, you don't know how much more he may need. No, Miranda, I'm going to have an eye on Dabney." "You're a dear, good fellow, anyway," said Miranda, "and I hope mother'll have the house all ready for us when we get back." "She will," replied Ham. "I shall hardly be easy till I see what she has done with it." CHAPTER IV. "That's him!" Dab was standing by the ponies, in front of a store in the village. His mother was making some purchases in the store, and Dab was thinking how the Morris house would look when it was finished, and it was at him the old farmer was pointing in answer to a question which had just been asked. The questioner was the sharp-eyed boy who had bothered poor Dick Lee that morning. At that moment, however, a young lady--quite young--came tripping along the sidewalk, and was stopped by Dab Kinzer with: "There, Jenny Walters, I forgot my label!" "Why, Dabney, is that you? How you startled me! Forgot your label?" "Yes," said Dab; "I'm in another new suit to-day, and I want to have a label with my name on it. You'd have known me, then." "But I know you now," exclaimed Jenny. "Why, I saw you yesterday."