Old Mr. Clifford nodded over his newspaper until his
spectacles clattered to the floor, at which they all laughed, and asked
for the news. His invalid wife lay upon the sofa in dreamy, painless
repose. To her the time was like a long, quiet nooning by the wayside of
life, with all her loved band around her, and her large, dark eyes rested
on one and another in loving, lingering glances--each so different, yet
each so dear! Sensible Leonard was losing no time, but was audibly
resting in a great wooden rocking-chair at the further end of the hall.
Maggie only, the presiding genius of the household, was not wilted by the
heat. She flitted in and out occasionally, looking almost girlish in her
white wrapper. She had the art of keeping house, of banishing dust and
disorder without becoming an embodiment of dishevelled disorder herself.
No matter what she was doing, she always appeared trim and neat, and in
the lover-like expression of her husband's eyes, as they often followed
her, she had her reward. She was not deceived by the semi-torpid
condition of the household, and knew well what would be expected in a
Fourth-of-July dinner. Nor was she disappointed. The tinkle of the bell
at two o'clock awakened unusual animation, and then she had her triumph.
Leonard beamed upon a hind-quarter of lamb roasted to the nicest turn of
brownness. A great dish of Champion-of-England pease, that supreme
product of the kitchen-garden, was one of the time-honored adjuncts,
while new potatoes, the first of which had been dug that day, had half
thrown off their mottled jackets in readiness for the feast.
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