Thus rebuked, and after some hesitation, the old gentleman with a queer expression took his seat in the "chair," and had his iron-gray head adjusted to the round black disks of the head-rest. Gram arranged his front lock with her comb, and said, "Now keep your eye on the little sock, Joseph, and look smilin';"--a superfluous piece of advice, as it proved, for he had already begun grinning awfully. The artist, who had his head under the black cloth of his camera, now suddenly looked forth and gave different advice. "Not too smilin'. Not so smilin' as that, quite," said he. But the Old Squire only grinned the more vigorously, showing several teeth. Gram went around in front by the artist. "Oh, no, Joseph, not near so smilin'!" she exclaimed. But do their best, they could not get the smile off his face. "Look more solemn, Joseph," Gram now exhorted him. "You are overdoing it." But so certain as the artist raised his hand to take off the cap from the camera, the Old Squire's face would begin to pucker again, and the artist was obliged to wait. We all grew scandalized at his unaccountable levity. Addison sat laughing silently in a chair behind, and Gram at last lost her patience. "If you were only a little boy, it wouldn't be quite so silly!" she exclaimed. "But an old man, with only a few years more on the earth, to behave so, is all out of character. Think of the shortness of life, Joseph, and the certainty of death." But still from some nervous perversity, the old gentleman's face drew up in the same inveterate pucker whenever Lockett raised his hand to uncap the camera. "O Joe, I'm astonished at you! I am for certain!" cried Gram, so vexed and angry that she lost all patience. She rushed to the door and looked out, to control her feelings. Theodora then drew near the Old Squire's side and whispered, "Think of the War, Grandpa." The War was then a topic of such terrible sadness for us that the mention of it, ordinarily, was sufficient to unloose the most poignant recollections. To grandfather, as to us all, it had brought a sable cloud of bereavement. But even thoughts of the War did not now long suffice to remove that grin--longer than till the Old Squire saw Lockett's hand raised. Then out jumped the all too "smilin' expression" again. Gram went out of doors altogether and walked along the sidewalk, in mortification and despite; her feelings were much outraged. Lockett now essayed to turn the conversation upon a current political topic, namely the nomination of General Grant for the Presidency; and it seemed as if the grin was at last exorcised. Yet when the artist attempted covertly to remove the cap, a hundred puckers gathered about Gramp's eyes again, his chin twitched, and even there were wrinkles on his nose.