"After I was in the sleigh with Ephraim, all my unhappiness and anxiety fled, and I enjoyed every bit of the ride. It was a lonely road, and part of the way it went through the woods where the lately fallen snow lay in pure white sheets that were written all over with the tracks of birds, and rabbits and other wild animals; and the stillness of the great woods was so deep and solemn that our love-talk was silenced, and we rode on singing hymns. Then out of the woods, and sweeping down into a hollow where pleasant farms were nestled snugly together, and so up to Ephraim's door. Mr. Jacob Allen was a forehanded farmer, and the house was by far the best in town. "When we drove up to the door, Mary Allen was at the window, watching for us. She ran out to the sleigh, and when Ephraim told her here was her sister Mercy, she laughed, and shook hands,--women did not kiss each other then,--and said she was glad I was come to stay a week. So my meeting her was not at all dreadful. "While Ephraim went around to put up the horse, Mary took me into the fore-room, where there was a fire, and helped me with my things, and was as sociable as if she had known me all her life. "The room was a great deal nicer than anything I had ever seen. I was almost afraid to step on the carpet at first; but then I remembered that it must have been meant to be stepped on, or it wouldn't have been laid on the floor. "Pretty soon Mrs. Allen and Prudence came in. Mrs. Allen was a very notable woman, and when she had told me how she made her cheese, and that she put down her butter in cedar firkins,--she seemed to think that pine ones were not fit for a Christian to use, and that my mother must be a terribly shiftless person to put up with them,--she said she must go and see to the pies that were baking. I don't think she was still five minutes at a time while I was there, but just driving about the house from morning till night. And yet there were her two girls to help her, and mother and I did the work for eight, and took in spinning all the year round. "I think Prudence didn't like housework. She was very intimate with Semantha Lee; and what Semantha said and did and wore was pretty much all her talk. All that week she was at work on old gowns, altering them to be like Semantha's. Prudence didn't seem to fancy me at the very first; and though I don't want to speak evil of her, she was certainly rather a hard person to get along with. "One day she would remark that I would be quite good-looking if my nose wasn't such a pug. And another day that it was a pity I had red hair, for really my other features were not so bad; and she said that my gown was just like one she had hung up in the garret; and so in this way she picked me to pieces, until it seemed as if she couldn't find a good thing in me. But this was not as bad as the way in which she talked to me about Semantha.