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148
The Country of the Pointed Firs
·
Sarah Orne Jewett
118
This
was
so
different
from
Mrs.
Todd's
usual
largeness
of
mind
that
I
had
a
moment's
uneasiness;
but
the
cloud
passed
quickly
over
her
spirit,
and
was
gone
with
the
offender.
There
never
was
a
more
generous
out-of-door
feast
along
the
coast
then
the
Bowden
family
set
forth
that
day.
To
call
it
a
picnic
would
make
it
seem
trivial.
The
great
tables
were
edged
with
pretty
oak-leaf
trimming,
which
the
boys
and
girls
made.
We
brought
flowers
from
the
fence-thickets
of
the
great
field;
and
out
of
the
disorder
of
flowers
and
provisions
suddenly
appeared
as
orderly
a
scheme
for
the
feast
as
the
marshal
had
shaped
for
the
procession.
I
began
to
respect
the
Bowdens
for
their
inheritance
of
good
taste
and
skill
and
a
certain
pleasing
gift
of
formality.
Something
made
them
do
all
these
things
in
a
finer
way
than
most
country
people
would
have
done
them.
As
I
looked
up
and
down
the
tables
there
was
a
good
cheer,
a
grave
soberness
that
shone
with
pleasure,
a
humble
dignity
of
bearing.
There
were
some
who
should
have
sat
below
the
salt
for
lack
of
this
good
breeding;
but
they
were
not
many.
So,
I
said
to
myself,
their
ancestors
may
have
sat
in
the
great
hall
of
some
old
French
house
in
the
Middle
Ages,
when
battles
and
sieges
and
processions
and
feasts
were
familiar
things.
The
ministers
and
Mrs.
Blackett,
with
a
few
of
their
rank
and
age,
were
put
in
places
of
honor,
and
for
once
that
I
looked
any
other
way
I
looked
twice
at
Mrs.
Blackett's
face,
serene
and
mindful
of
privilege
and
responsibility,
the
mistress
by
simple
fitness
of
this
great
day.
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