There Tirzah Ann sat out on the portico, all dressed up in a cool, mull dress—it was one I bought for her, before she was married, but it wus washed and done up clean, and looked as good as new. It was pure white, with little bunches of blue forget-me-nots on it, and she had a bunch of the same posys in her hair and in the bosom of her frock, (there is a hull bed of ’em in the yard.) She is a master hand for dressin’ up, and lookin’ pretty, but at the same time, would be very equinomical, if she wus let alone. She looked the picture of health and enjoyment, plump and rosy, and happy as a queen. And she was a queen. Queen of her husband’s heart, and settin’ up on that pure and lofty throne of constant and deathless love, she looked first-rate, and felt so. It had been a very warm day, really hot, and Whitfield, I s’pose, had come home kinder tired, so he had stretched himself out at full length on the grass, in front of the portico; and there he lay, with his hands clasped under his head, a-talkin’ and laughin’, and lookin’ up into Tirzah Ann’s face, as radiant and lovin’ as if she was the sun, and he a sunflower. But that simily, though very poetical and figurative, don’t half express the good looks, and health, and happiness on both their faces, as they looked at each other, and that babe, that most beautifulest of children, a-toddlin’ round, first up to one, and then the other, with her bright eyes a-dancin’, and her cheeks red as roses. But the minute she ketched sight of her grandpa and me and the mare, she jest run down to the gate, as fast as her little legs could carry her, and I guess she got a pretty good kissin’ from Josiah and me. And Whitfield and Tirzah Ann came hurryin’ down to the gate, glad enough to see us, as they always be. Josiah, of course, had to take that beautiful child for a little ride, and Whitfield said he guessed he would go, too. So I got out, and went in, and as we sot there on the stoop, Tirzah Ann up and told me what she and Whitfield wus a-goin’ to do. They wus agoin’ away for a rest. “Why,” said I, “I hardly ever, in my hull life, see anybody look so rested as you do now, both on you. How, under the sun, can you be rested any more than you be now?” “Well,” she said, “it’s so very genteel to go. Mrs. Skidmore is a-goin’, and Mrs. Skidmore says nobody who made any pretensions to bein’ genteel stayed to home durin’ the heated term, no matter how cool the place wus they wus a-livin’ in.” “What do they go for mostly?” says I, in a very cool way; for I didn’t like the idee. “Oh, for health and——” But says I, interruptin’ of her: “Hain’t you and Whitfield enjoyin’ good health?” “Never could be better health than we both have got,” says she. “But,” says she, “folks go for health and pleasure.” But says I: “Hain’t you a-takin’ comfort here—solid comfort?” “Yes,” says she. “Nobody can be happier than Whitfield and I, every day of our life.”