her Pomona. I did the same whenever I could think not to say Bologna—which seemed to come very pat for some reason or other.
As for the boarder, he generally called her Altoona, connecting her in some way with the process of stopping for refreshments, in which she was an adept.
She was an earnest, hearty girl. She was always in a good humor, and when I asked her to do anything, she assented in a bright, cheerful way, and in a loud tone full of good-fellowship, as though she would say:
“Certainly, my high old cock! To be sure I will. Don't worry about it—give your mind no more uneasiness on that subject. I'll bring the hot water.”
She did not know very much, but she was delighted to learn, and she was very strong. Whatever Euphemia told her to do, she did instantly with a bang. What pleased her better than anything else was to run up and down the gang-plank, carrying buckets of water to water the garden. She delighted in out-door work, and sometimes dug so vigorously in our garden that she brought up pieces of the deck-planking with every shovelful.
Our boarder took the greatest interest in her, and sometimes watched her movements so intently that he let his pipe go out.
“What a whacking girl that would be to tread out grapes in the vineyards of Italy! She'd make wine cheap,” he once remarked.
“Then I'm glad she isn't there,” said Euphemia, “for wine oughtn't to be cheap.”
Euphemia was a thorough little temperance woman.
The one thing about Pomona that troubled me more than anything else was her taste for literature. It was not literature to which I objected, but her very peculiar taste. She would read in the kitchen every night after she had washed the dishes, but if she had not read aloud, it would not have made so much difference to me. But I am naturally very sensitive to external impressions, and I do not like the company of people who, like our girl, cannot read without pronouncing in a measured and distinct voice every word of what they are reading. And when the matter thus read appeals to one's every sentiment of aversion, and there is no way of escaping it, the case is hard indeed.
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