Holidays at the Grange | Page 3

competitors; the children think that she can speak every language, and she is really a refined and accomplished girl. She has not seen Mary or Cornelia for a couple of years, and great are the rejoicings at their meeting; they are warm friends already. Her manly brother Tom, although younger, looks older than she does: a fine, handsome fellow he is. The younger Greens are almost too numerous to particularize; Harry and Louis, Anna and Gertrude--merry children all, noisy and frolicsome, but well-inclined and tolerably submissive to authority; they ranged from nine years old, upward. Just as the sun was setting, and Aunt Lucy had almost given them up, the third family of cousins arrived, the Boltons. Charlie Bolton is the elder of the two--he will be called Charlie to the end of his days, if he live to be a white-haired grandfather, he is so pleasant and full of fun, so ready with his joke and merry laugh; he is Cornelia's great friend and ally, and the two together would keep any house wide awake. His sister Alice is rather sentimental, for which she is heartily laughed at by her harum-skarum brother; but she is at an age when girls are apt to take this turn--fourteen; she will leave it all behind her when she is older. Sentimentality may be considered the last disease of childhood; measles, hooping-cough, and scarlatina having been successfully overcome, if the girl passes through this peril unscathed, and no weakness is left in her mental constitution, she will probably be a woman of sane body and mind. Alice is much given to day-dreams, and to reading novels by stealth; she is very romantic, and would dearly love to be a heroine, if she could. The only objection to the scheme, in her mind, is that her eyes have a very slight cast, and that her nose is un petit nez retrouss��--in other words, something of a pug; and Alice has always been under the impression that a heroine must have straight vision, and a Grecian nose. Hers is a face that will look very arch and piquante, when she acquires more sense, and lays aside her lack-a-daisical airs; but, at present, the expression and the features are very incongruous. It is excessively mortifying! but it cannot be helped; many times a day does she cast her eyes on the glass, but the obstinate pug remains a pug, and Alice is forced to conclude that she is not intended for a heroine. Yet she always holds herself ready for any marvellous adventure that may turn up, and she is perfectly convinced that there must be concealed doors, long winding passages in the walls, and perhaps a charmingly horrible dungeon, at The Grange. Why not? Such things are of constant occurrence in story books, and that house is the oldest one she knows. She is determined on this visit to explore it thoroughly, and perhaps she may become the happy discoverer of a casket of jewels, or a skeleton, or some other treasure.
Thirteen young people there are in all, with pleasant faces and joyful hearts; and none of them, I am happy to say were of the perfect sort you read of in books. Had they been, their Aunt Lucy, who was used to real children, would have entertained serious fears for their longevity. They all required a caution or a reprimand now and then, and none were so wise as not to make an occasional silly speech, or to do a heedless action. But they were good-tempered and obliging, as healthy children should always be, and were seldom cross unless they felt a twinge of toothache. How fast did their tongues run, that first hour! How much had all to tell, and how much to hear! And how happy did Uncle John appear, as he sat in the centre of the group, with little Amy on his lap, leaning her languid head against his broad and manly chest, while a cluster of the younger ones contended together for possession of the unoccupied knee.
After the hearty, cheerful country supper, the whole party of visitors was escorted into a dark room adjoining the hall, while Aunt Lucy and Cousin Mary were engaged in certain preparations, well understood by the older guests, who were too discreet to allay the curiosity of the younger ones, who for the first time were allowed to share the hospitality of the Grange at Christmas. At last the folding-doors were thrown open, and the hall appeared to be in a blaze of light; colored lamps were suspended in festoons from the ceiling, showing how prettily the old portraits were adorned with evergreens. Even the man in armor looked less grim, as if his temper was mollified by the ivy wreath wound around his