“I don’t know just what the reason is my work looks better than some,” said Aunty Peebles, flushing with delight, one morning when Polly had said, “Oh, what bee-yu-tiful even, little bits of stitches you do make!” “It’s experience, that’s all it is,” said Mrs. Manser, dejectedly, as she sat gathering the top of a pink gingham sleeve; “if I’d been brought up to it instead of all the education I had that’s no good to me now, I should be thankful, I’m sure.” “She’d never be thankful for anything,” whispered Mrs. Ramsdell, who was ripping out bastings and constantly encountering knots which had been “machined in” and did not soothe her temper; “’taint in her, and you know it, Miss Peebles, well as I do.” “Mary,” said Mrs. Manser, fretfully, “don’t sit there doing nothing. Let me see how you’re getting on with that patchwork. My back’s almost broken, and I’ve got chills. You go and tell Father Manser to bring in some wood, and then you thread me up some needles, and fill the pincushion, and I’ve got some basting for you to do. What a looking square you’ve made of that last one! Well, I don’t believe Miss Hetty’ll keep you more than just the month, and all this sewing and these two nice ginghams will go for nothing.” “I’ll try to behave so she’ll keep me,” said Polly, with a flushed face as she hurried out to old Father Manser. She returned with him after a moment. He was a thin little man, who had a kind word for everybody, but spoke in a husky tone, which Mrs. Ramsdell claimed Mrs. Manser had “frightened him into with her education when she first married him.” However that might be, Father Manser never made a statement in his wife’s presence without an appealing glance toward her for approval. “Fill up the stove,” said Mrs. Manser, in her most dismal tone, “and see if you can take the chill off this room, father. I presume, though, it’s in my bones and won’t come out; I notice the others are warm enough, for, of course, I’d have heard complaints if they weren’t. Then you might as well oil the machine and get ready to run up the seams of those aprons, if your mother ever gets them done.” “I declare it riles me to see a man doing woman’s work,” said Mrs. Ramsdell, tugging at a vicious knot, “and doing it all hodge-podge into the bargain!” Father Manser, all unconscious of her unfavorable criticism, filled up the stove, and then set about oiling the sewing-machine. By the time he had finished, Grandma Manser had put the last careful basting in the last apron seam, and his work was ready for him. “Now, don’t make your feet go so fast,” cautioned Mrs. Manser, “and stop off carefully, so you won’t break the needles the way you did yesterday, and do keep by the bastings, father. Are your specs on? No, they aren’t. You put them on, this minute!” “Yes’m,” said Father Manser, meekly, and when his spectacles were astride his nose, he was allowed to put his feet on the treadles and start on his first seam.