However, she knew he was having a very
good time when he didn't see her at all. The real reason why she ached
and sighed over Squire Hall's pantaloons was, that she heard Ned in the
next room helping Hannah-Ann Hall pack up the dinner for their grand
Snake Hill picnic, and diverting the same Hannah-Ann with such wit and
humor and frolic, that she declared several times she should split, and
begged him not to be so funny.
Now 'Tenty never had a pleasant day, unless Ned was with her,--it had
got as far as that; and the idea that he could and did enjoy himself so
thoroughly and heartily without her was a dull pang that ate into her
soul continually, and made her forlorn. Oh, these women! these pitiful
creatures! not magnanimity enough in a whole race of them to be visible
to the naked eye! jealous dogs-in-the-manger! If they weren't useful
domestically, I should vote for having them exterminated from this great
generous world, and give place to some better institution, which no
doubt could be got up by the india-rubber companies or the scientific
conventions. But as Alphonso of Castile did not make the world, one must
take it as it is; and I will say, for the encouragement of philosophers,
that I have known one magnanimous woman, and she a beautiful woman,
moreover.
So 'Tenty sewed, and ached, and made Aunt 'Viny's bed and her gruel,
read her Bible and prayed for Ned Parker, and thought she was growing
very old, till one night he asked her to go to singing-school with him;
whereupon she put on a pink calico dress, and began to recover her youth
most wonderfully.
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