Josiah had to go to Jonesville that afternoon after necessaries, and I sot all alone in my cheerful kitchen almost lost in a train of pleasant thoughts, and some sort o' pensive ones, and at the same time windin' a skein of blue-and-white clouded yarn for Josiah's socks, when I hearn a little rap at the side door and opened it, and see to my surprise Miss Greene Smythe's black coachman, Pompey, who handed me a note from his mistress, sayin' she wanted me to answer it, so I told him to come in and sot him a chair. He stood by it, twiddlin' his cap round in his hands and hesitatin', but on my tellin' him agin to set, he sot. Sidled down into the chair, settin' on the extreme edge of it.
And I took out my readin' specks and opened the note; it wuz big and square, and had a curious-lookin' seal on the back, with some strange figgers and a word or two on't, but it didn't seem to be spelt right; I couldn't make out what it meant; it wuz sunthin' like this, Astra Castra Numan luman.
But if she meant anything about castor oil or somebody by the name of Newman, anybody could see that there wuzn't any spellin' to it. But then, I sez to myself as I read it, though I pity such a speller, let me not be hauty because I have had advantages and spelt down the school repeatedly.
So I opened the letter. It wuz a invitation for me to
