"This is Miss Nancy Craddock, gentlemen, named after my mother, and she's going to beat out the Bend in her chicken raising, which she's brought along with her. Come over, youngsters, and look her over. The fire in the parlor don't burn more than a half cord of wood on a Sunday, and you can come over Saturday afternoon and cut it against the Sabbath, with a welcome to any one of the spare rooms and a slab of Rufus's spare rib and a couple of both breakfast and supper muffins." All of the older men laughed at this sweeping invitation, and all the younger greeted it with ears that became instantly crimson. I verily believe they would one and all have fled and left me sitting there yet if a diversion had not arrived in the person of Mrs. Silas, who came bustling out of the door of the grocery or post-office or bank; whichever it is called, is according to your errand there. Mrs. Si was tall, and almost as broad as the door itself, with the rosiest cheeks and the bluest eyes I had ever beheld, and they crinkled with loveliness around their corners. She had white water-waves that escaped their decorous plastering into waving little tendril curls, and her mouth was as curled and red-lipped and dimpled as a girl's. In a twinkling of those blue eyes I fell out of the carriage into a pair of strong, soft, tender arms covered with stiff gray percale, and received two hearty kisses, one on each cheek. "God bless you, honeybunch, and I'm glad William has brought you home at last, the rascal." As she hugged me she reached out a strong hand and gave father first a good shake by his shoulder and then by his hand. "Fine girl, eh, Mary?" answered father as he returned the shoulder shake with a pat on the broad gray percale back, and retained the strong hand in his, with a frank clinging. I wondered if-- "She's her Aunt Mary's blessed child, and I will have her making riz biscuits like old Madam Craddock's black Sue for you two boys in less than a week," she answered him, with a laugh that somehow sounded a bit dewy. "Oh, do you know about chickens, Mrs.--I mean, Aunt Mary?" I asked as I clung to the hand to which father was not clinging. "Bless my heart, what's that I see setting up on old Madam Craddock's cushions? Is it a rooster or a dream bird?" she answered me by exclaiming as she caught sight of Mr. G. Bird sitting in lonely state, but as good as gold, upon the rose-leather cushions. "I thought I feathered out the finest chickens in the Harpeth Valley, but this one isn't human, you might say," and as she spoke she shook off father and me, and approached the carriage and peered in with the reverence of a real poultry artist. "Bless my heart!" she again exclaimed. "Those are just Miss Nancy's whims to take the place of her card-routs and sinful dancing habits," said Uncle Cradd, with a great and indulgent amusement as all the little crowd of native friends gathered around to look at the Bird family.