Gwynne's eyes met mine. "The wistaria on the dining-room porch is going to bloom, don't you want to see it?" said he, biting his lips. We retreated to the wistaria, and both of us, propped against the dining-room wall, gave away to hysterical laughter, all the more violent because we must smother it. Gwynne's nerves, I think, were a little unstrung by all he had been through the last melancholy week. "I--I can't help it----" he gasped. "I know it's all wrong, but I can't help it. They're so funny!" We were presently visited with retribution for our ungodly merriment; for, as we stood there, an Armenian--or Bulgarian--gentleman came around the corner of the house with a wheelbarrow heaped with the spoil of the garret, and after him another bearing on his shoulders our old hair-trunk. Hardly any hair was left upon it, now; but there it was long and low and round-topped with rows of brass nails black with verdigris. It was going away on the Armenian shoulders--going out of our lives forever like those childish days. Gwynne looked at me with a rather tremulous smile. "'Ha, Saint Edward! Ha, Saint George!' exclaimed the Black Knight, cutting down a man at each invocation," he quoted. "Don't, Mary!" For I am ashamed to say that I sat down on the top step and cried openly, while the boy tried to comfort me. CHAPTER THREE Herewith began another volume in the saga of the old Gwynne house. After nearly fifty years of Gwynnes, it must now pass to other ownership. The thing happens every day, and should be no great tragedy; few Americans are born and live and die in the same house, and a building of any sort rarely remains the property of one family for more than a generation. But the Gwynnes, one and all, mourned aloud and refused to be comforted. Governor Gwynne's house, Uncle Samuel's house, the house that great man planned and built, whose hospitalities had been enjoyed by the very best and highest in the land! Why, the State ought to buy that house! The State was of a different opinion, although the house was offered at a ridiculously low price, not more than twice what it was worth. None of the Gwynnes, it appeared, could afford to buy it in, or even rent it, the expense of living there was so terrifying. At that distance from town, one must keep a horse and carriage, the street-cars being so far away; the care of the park and garden required one man's whole time; and there was the huge old house itself. It had at least sixteen rooms, and with its high ceilings, and long rambling hallways, took as much coal to heat it in our winters as three ordinary houses. Besides, it had--ahem--undeniably run down somewhat during poor Harriet's administration, and was in need of costly repairs. No, alack and alas! the house must be sold or leased--dreadful profanation! The furniture was at last cleared out; the Governor's portrait went down to the State-house, and you may see him there at this moment, in line with all the rest of the governors,