"There is something statuesque about her," said Pepton, who ardently admired her, "and yet there isn't. A statue could never equal her unless we knew there was a probability of movement in it. And the only statues which have that are the Jarley wax-works, which she does not resemble in the least. There is only one thing that that girl needs to make her a perfect archer, and that is to be able to aim better." This was true. Miss Rosa did need to aim better. Her arrows had a curious habit of going on all sides of the target, and it was very seldom that one chanced to stick into it. For if she did make a hit, we all knew it was chance and that there was no probability of her doing it again. Once she put an arrow right into the centre of the gold,--one of the finest shots ever made on the ground,--but she didn't hit the target again for two weeks. She was almost as bad a shot as Pepton, and that is saying a good deal. One evening I was sitting with Pepton on the little front porch of the old ladies' house, where we were taking our after-dinner smoke while Miss Martha and Miss Maria were washing, with their own white hands, the china and glass in which they took so much pride. I often used to go over and spend an hour with Pepton. He liked to have some one to whom he could talk on the subjects which filled his soul, and I liked to hear him talk. "I tell you," said he, as he leaned back in his chair, with his feet carefully disposed on the railing so that they would not injure Miss Maria's Madeira-vine, "I tell you, sir, that there are two things I crave with all my power of craving--two goals I fain would reach, two diadems I would wear upon my brow. One of these is to kill an eagle--or some large bird--with a shaft from my good bow. I would then have it stuffed and mounted, with the very arrow that killed it still sticking in its breast. This trophy of my skill I would have fastened against the wall of my room or my hall, and I would feel proud to think that my grandchildren could point to that bird--which I would carefully bequeath to my descendants--and say, `My grand'ther shot that bird, and with that very arrow.' Would it not stir your pulses if you could do a thing like that?" "I should have to stir them up a good deal before I could do it," I replied. "It would be a hard thing to shoot an eagle with an arrow. If you want a stuffed bird to bequeath, you'd better use a rifle." "A rifle!" exclaimed Pepton. "There would be no glory in that. There are lots of birds shot with rifles--eagles, hawks, wild geese, tomtits--" "Oh, no!" I interrupted, "not tomtits."