slang word, I spoze—and then they kicked up their dirty heels and run and jumped over a fence, and one boy turned two or three summersets, while the other ones kicked at us. Worse lookin' children I never see, nor worse actin' ones, not in my hull durin' life; I felt stirred up and mad clear to my bones as they disappeared over a hill. And I sez to Josiah:
"I should think that the ennoblin' influence of Evangeline Allen Piddock would have elevated even neighborin' children and kep' 'em from bein' perfect savages like these."
And Josiah sez, "I'd love to try the ennoblin' influence of a good birch gad on 'em," and I didn't blame him, not a mite. Anon we approached a shamblin', run-*down lookin' place, the house with the paint all off in spots and the picket fence dilapidated, the pickets and rails hangin' loose, and weeds runnin' loose over the yard, and Josiah sez, "We might inquire here where Evangeline lives."
I sez, "She wouldn't have anything to do with folks that live in such a lookin' place, but it wouldn't do any hurt to inquire."
So Josiah approached the rickety piazza, and carefully stepped up on the broken doorstep and rapped, the door-bell hangin' down broke. He rapped agin and yet agin, and the third time the door wuz opened and a female appeared clad in a long flowing robe of sage green, and her kinder yellow hair hangin' loose, only banded in a Greek sort of a way with a dirty ribbin and the robe wuz dirty and two or three holes in it.
Sez Josiah, "Mom, can you tell me where she that wuz Evangeline Allen lives, Miss Piddock that now is?"
