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When she had a quilting, or Dorcas S'iety at her house she gen'ally borrowed Miss Higgins's wooden leg to stump around on; it was considerable shorter than her other pin, but much she minded that. She said she couldn't abide crutches when she had company, becuz they were so slow; said when she had company and things had to be done, she wanted to get up and hump herself.

Every woman is born knowing how mice delight to hide in skirts. After a moment Dorcas opened the door and came out, passed the group of watchers without a word and crossed the street to Henderson's. Coming back a minute later with a trap, she re-entered the room, set the trap and waited. So did the others, breathless, clinging to each other.

In the "square room," a modern long looking-glass, framed in mahogany, and surmounted by the American emblem of triumph, was the astonishment of the neighbors, and in Walton those were many, though the population was small. Dorcas looked wistfully and wishingly at the oval pin; but with no more notion of what she was looking at than the child who gazes into the heavens on a winter night.

The one is the cure of a paralytic, which pairs off with the well-known story in the Gospels concerning the man that was borne by four, and let down through the roof into Christ's presence. The other of them, the raising of Dorcas, or Tabitha, of course corresponds with the three resurrections of dead people which are recorded in the Gospels. And now, note the likenesses.

Dorcas knew who it was, without turning round, a dark, squat woman, broad all over; broad in the hips, the waist, the face, and stamped with the race-mark of high cheekbones. Her thick, straight black hair was cut "tin-basin style;" she wore men's boots, and her petticoats were nearly up to her knees. "Good morning, Nancy!" called Dorcas, blithely, wringing out her dishcloth.

One of these introduced herself to Miss Fitch as Sister Samantha. She had a round, comfortable face, and the boys and girls, who had felt an awe of the grave Elder, recovered courage as they looked at her. She said they could "go round" if they wanted to, and called a younger sister named Dorcas to show them the way. Sister Dorcas had a pale, rather dissatisfied face.

On coming in at the door of the square room, with its sanded floor, its old desk, its spare bed in the corner, and its cherry table with wavy outlines, which had belonged to Colonel Fox's mother, Dorcas found the cloth already laid, and the bonnets and cardinals of half a dozen old friends on the bed.

Suppose the admiration of our enthusiast for Rembrandt had been noted in the select suburb where he lived: suppose his mother was one of those estimable ladies who hold monthly Dorcas meetings in their drawing-rooms: suppose that while the ladies were working at useful garments for the poor, she persuaded her son to discourse on Rembrandt: suppose, because the petition came from his mother that he, very much against his will, consented.

'Well, you know, Radie, women like wicked fellows: it is contrast, I suppose, but they do; and I'm sure, from what Bracton has said to me I know him intimately that Dorcas likes him, and I can't conceive why they are not married. 'It is very happy, for her at least, they are not, said Rachel, and a long silence ensued.

Henceforth her path was open and clear, her duties defined, and with daily occupation of hand and thought she strove to displace all that had ever made her other than the cheerful and busy Dorcas. For the last time, she closed and put away the box. The best aphorisms are pointed expressions of the results of observation, experience, and reflection.