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Show 298 shelling peas, peeling potatoes, picking pin-feathers out of fowls, and other preparatory arra.ngcmcnts,-Dinah every once in a while interrupting her meditations to give a poke, or a rap on the bead, to some of the young operators, with the pudding-stick that lay by her side. In fact, Dinah ruled over tho woolly heads of the younger members with a rod of iron, and seemed to consider them born for no earthly purpose but to "save her steps," as she phrased it. I t was the spirit of tho system under which she had grown up, and sho carried it out to its full extent. :Miss Ophelia, after passing on her reformatory tour through all the other parts of the establishment, now entered tho kitchen. Dinah had heard, from various sources, what was going on, and resol ved to stand on defensive and conservative ground,- mentally determined to oppose and ignore every new measure, without any actual and observable contest. ~rhe kitchen was a large brick-floored apartment, with o. great old-fi1shioned fireplace stretching along one side of it,-an arrangement which St. Claro had vainly tried to persuade Dinah to exchange for the convenience of a modern cook-stove. Not she. No Puseyitc, or conservative of any school, was ever more inflexibly attached to time-honored inconveniencies than Dinah. When St. Clare had first r eturned from the north, impressed with the system nncl order of his uncle's kitchen arrangements, he had largely provided his own with an array of cupboards, drawers, and various apparatus, to induce systematic regulation, under the sanguine illusion that it would be of any possible assistance to Dinah in her arrangements. He might as well have provided them for a squirrel or a magpie. ~rhe more dru.wers and closets there were, the moro hiding-holes could Dinah make for the accommodation LIFE Ai\JONO THE LOWLY. 299 of old rags, hair-combs, old shoes, ribbons, cast-off artificial flowers, and other articles of vcrtu, wherein her soul clclightC<l. Wl10n Miss Ophelia entered the kitchen, Dinah <lid not rise, but smokeJ on in sublime tranquimty, regarding her movements obliquely out of tho corner of her eye, but apparently intent only on tho operations around her. r.Iiss Ophelia. commenced opening a set of drawers. "What is this drawer for, Dinah 1" she said. ''It's handy for most any thing, Missis," said Dinah. So it appeared to be. From the variety it contained, Miss Ophelia pulled out first o fine damask table-cloth stained with blood, having evidently been used to envelop some mw meat. "What's this, Dinah? You don' t wrap up meat in your mistress' best table-cloths 1" "0 Lor, l\iissis, no ; the towels was all a rnissin',-so I jest did it. I laid out to wash that ar,-that 's why I put it thar." "Shif'lcss ! " said Miss Ophclh to herself, proceeding to tumble over the dra.wcr, where she found a nutmeg-grater and two or three nutmegs, a Methodist hymn-beok, a couple of soiled ?11ad.ras handkerchiefs, some yarn and knitting-work, a paper of toba.cco and a pipe, a. few crackers, one or two gilded china-saucers with some pomade in them, one or two thin old shoes, a piece of flannel carefully pinned up enclosing some small white onions, several damask table-napkins, some coarse crash towels, some twine and darning-needles, and several broken papers, from which sundry sweet herbs were sifting into tho drawer. "Where do you keep your nutmegs, Dinah?" said Miss Ophelia, with tho air of one who prayed for patience. |