“She saw him only a few minutes each time, after the first, and I thought she was rather peremptory. There’s Doctor Theophilus again, and he’s footed it from the Avenue station. The Reverend never was so devoted to us as he has been since T’férgore’s arrival,” said Julian, smiling drolly. I had a nervous dread of Julian’s uncle; he was the most respectable man who ever had the right to add Doctor of Divinity to his name. Large, broad, and ponderous, his mere presence seemed to reprehend the playful antics of life. I was afraid of his long upper lip, which shut as close as a snuff-box lid. His white neckties awed me, and the solidity of his choice words reproached me. Behind his back, and in spite of Julian’s laughing remonstrance, I had rechristened Uncle Doctor Theophilus, whose surname was Marvin, The Old Daguerreotype. It is true he had not his case on, though the snap with which it formerly shut had probably passed into his lips. I could even fancy that when you got a side-light on him he retained the glare of the old daguerreotype, and effaced himself in a sheet of glitter. His expression seemed unalterably made up; and though he looked more ancient than other men of his age, I knew he thought himself well taken, and all his tints neat without being gaudy. He oppressed me so that I frequently wanted to rub him out. I always trod on a stone and turned my foot, or ran against a chair, when the Old Daguerreotype was by. Or he threw me into a nervous trance, and I sat with parted lips, glaring eyes, and aching neck, fancying that my own daguerreotype was being taken. Aunt Doctor Theophilus used to be a worthy companion picture to him, but death years ago effaced her lineaments and snapped her case shut, to be opened no more. I felt that I could hardly stand the Old Daguerreotype just at this time, but said to Julian it was kind of him, taken in such a precise attitude as he was, to dust himself walking out from the Avenue, on our account. “Oh, it isn’t the first time he has done it,” said Julian. “Something about our rural domicile has seized upon Uncle Doctor. He didn’t go out of town this year, and he’s taking whiffs of the country between sermons.” “Between poses,” I suggested softly. “I hope Jennie isn’t bothered by his coming. She takes strong antipathies, and he does make one’s backbone ache.” “Oh, she stands it,” said Julian laughing, “affably, as if she were the artist who had taken him.” I turned around towards Jennie as Julian went to the gate to meet his uncle. She was bringing T’férgore across the porch and smoothing down the angel robes. She herself looked like a Madonna picture, pale and somewhat saddened, but most womanly, most touching. “Jennie,” I said, as she put T’férgore on my lap, standing before me to do so, “you have taken care of me as only a woman can, and pulled me through to paradise.”