We've got the sunniest youngster here you ever saw; his mother and

Aunt Ruth and Uncle Silas all died insane, but he is as placid and

unexcitable as a cow.

Good-by, my dear. I am sorry this is not a more cheerful letter, though

at this moment nothing unpleasant seems to be happening. It's eleven

o'clock, and I have just stuck my head into the corridor, and all is

quiet except for two banging shutters and leaking eaves. I promised Jane

I would go to bed at ten. Good night, and joy be wi' ye baith!

SALLIE.

P.S. There is one thing in the midst of all my troubles that I have to

be grateful for: the Hon. Cy has been stricken with a lingering attack

of grippe. In a burst of thankfulness I sent him a bunch of violets.

P.S. 2. We are having an epidemic of pinkeye.

May 16. Good morning, my dear Judy!

Three days of sunshine, and the J. G. H. is smiling.

I am getting my immediate troubles nicely settled. Those beastly

blankets have dried at last, and our camps have been made livable again.

They are floored with wooden slats and roofed with tar paper. (Mr.

Witherspoon calls them chicken coops.) We are digging a stone-lined

ditch to convey any further cloudbursts from the plateau on which they

stand to the cornfield below. The Indians have resumed savage life, and

their chief is back at his post.

The doctor and I have been giving Loretta Higgins's nerves our most

careful consideration. We think that this barrack life, with its

constant movement and stir, is too exciting, and we have decided that

the best plan will be to board her out in a private family, where she

will receive a great deal of individual attention.

The doctor, with his usual resourcefulness, has produced the family.

They live next door to him and are very nice people; I have just

returned from calling. The husband is foreman of the casting room at the

iron works, and the wife is a comfortable soul who shakes all over

when she laughs. They live mostly in their kitchen in order to keep the

parlor neat; but it is such a cheerful kitchen that I should like to

live in it myself. She has potted begonias in the window and a nice

purry tiger cat asleep on a braided rug in front of the stove. She bakes

on Saturday--cookies and gingerbread and doughnuts. I am planning to pay

my weekly call upon Loretta every Saturday morning at eleven o'clock.

Apparently I made as favorable an impression on Mrs. Wilson as she made

on me. After I had gone, she confided to the doctor that she liked me

because I was just as common as she was.




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