“Never mind,” said he; “the boy's right. I told Gilbert this very afternoon that it was about time to speak to the old man; and he allowed it was. Come out with me and don't be afeard--I'll do the talkin'.” Hand in hand they went into the kitchen, Sally blushing and hanging back a little. Farmer Fairthorn had just come in from the barn, and was warming his hands at the fire. Mother Fairthorn might have had her suspicions, but it was her nature to wait cheerfully, and say nothing. “See here, Daddy and Mammy!” said Mark, “have either o' you any objections to Sally and me bein' a pair?” Farmer Fairthorn smiled, rubbed his hands together, and turning to his wife, asked,--“What has Mammy to say to it?” She looked up at Mark with her kindly eyes, in which twinkled something like a tear, and said,--“I was guessin' it might turn out so between you two, and if I'd had anything against you, Mark, I wouldn't ha' let it run on. Be a steady boy, and you'll make Sally a steady woman. She's had pretty much her own way.” Thereupon Farmer Fairthorn, still rubbing his hands, ventured to remark,--“The girl might ha' done worse.” This was equivalent to a hearty commendation of the match, and Mark so understood it. Sally kissed her mother, cried a little, caught her gown on a corner of the kitchen-table, and thus the betrothal was accepted as a family fact. Joe and Jake somewhat disturbed the bliss of the evening, it is true, by bursting into the room from time to time, staring significantly at the lovers, and then rushing out again with loud whoops and laughter. Sally could scarcely await the coming of the next day, to visit Martha Deane. At first she felt a little piqued that she had not received the news from Martha's own lips, but this feeling speedily vanished in the sympathy with her friend's trials. She was therefore all the more astonished at the quiet, composed bearing of the latter. The tears she had expected to shed were not once drawn upon. “O, Martha!” she cried, after the first impetuous outburst of feeling,--“to think that it has all turned out just as I wanted! No, I don't quite mean that; you know I couldn't wish you to have crosses; but about Gilbert! And it's too bad--Mark has told me dreadful things, but I hope they're not all true; you don't look like it; and I'm so glad, you can't think!” Martha smiled, readily untangling Sally's thoughts, and said,--“I mustn't complain, Sally. Nothing has come to pass that I had not prepared my mind to meet. We will only have to wait a little longer than you and Mark.” “No you won't!” Sally exclaimed. “I'll make Mark wait, too! And everything must be set right--somebody must do something! Where's Betsy Lavender?” “Here!” answered the veritable voice of the spinster, through the open door of the small adjoining room. “Gracious, how you frightened me!” cried Sally. “But, Betsy, you seem to be able to help everybody; why can't you do something for Martha and Gilbert?”