WE ARE ALL COUSINS TOGETHER.

BY FRANCES LEE.

THE Cobb family were at breakfast.

'A little more gravy, if you please,' said Mrs. Cobb.

As she raised her plate there was a loud, single knock at the door, which opened instantly, apparently of itself.

'Ho! it's Mr. Wiggin,' said Mr. Cobb to himself in a disappointed tone, as though he had expected to see the Secretary of War—or at least a contraband. 'Good morning, Mr. Wiggin,' said he affably aloud,

'Your servant, Sir! Good morning!' returned the visitor, stamping the snow from his boots in the same emphatic manner that he spoke. He was so large a man that he seemed exaggerated, with hair that had once been red, and whiskers that still were.

'Help yourself to a chair, Mr. Wiggin,' said Mrs. Cobb, who had forgotten all about wanting gravy. But he preferred the corner of the wood-box, where ` he sat with an old hat on his head, and his brawny hands clasped about one knee, as fearing it might, in its energy, walk away of itself.

'I may as well be brief, and come right to the point. I am a plain man, as you know, neighbor Cobb, and when I have any thing to say, speak out a leetle-blunt, we'll say, without the ceremony and palaver, that certain ones of our neighbors have I won't call no names on this occasion, you understand whom I mean well enough.' Of course he meant Colonel Dempster, to whom he was opposed in every thing, simply because it was his nature and life to be opposed to somebody. Having given the inevitable hit at the urbane Colonel, he proceeded: 'My business, and the reason why I called so early this morning, is to have some talk with you about buying young critters. It is my purpose and intention to take a fair start to-morrow morning for Vermont, to look for some. I believe I am not mistaken in thinking you want more stock, and therefore I called in to say, if you want to join me in an expedition of this kind, be ready to step aboard of my craft at precisely half-past five o'clock to-morrow morning. I am a man of few words, what do you say, neighbor Cobb, yes or no?'

Neighbor Cobb took a moment to consider, and then assenting to his need of more stock, did n't know but he could arrange to leave home to-morrow as well as any time.

'Half-past five o'clock precisely! I have told you just how it is; I want to get an early start,' reïterated Mr. Wiggin, and releasing his knee from durance, without the fashionable superfluity of administering the oath of allegiance, he followed it actively through the doorway.

At half-past five precisely, on the next morning, the mercury stood at a discouraging distance below zero, but Mr. Wiggin's blue pung and gray horse drew

up before Mr. Cobb's gate, with all the more zest, for he had an especial relish for outgeneralling the weather, and never yielded his plans a whit for its rigor or inclemency.

The travellers were leagues away from their pig-sties and milk-pails when the sun came back from China, and showed with what opals and diamonds the prodigal frost-king had been decorating even the humblest wayside bush and tree; and before nightfall they were near an old and aristocratic town, where Mrs. Cobb's cousin, Mrs. Doctor Danvers, resided.

'What do you say to giving cousin Danvers a call?' said Mr. Cobb.

'I am agreed to that,' returned Mr. Wiggin. 'But how is it, have your folks straw and provender enough?'

'Yes! I expect they are very fore-handed people, and Doctor Danvers is quite a likely sort of a man, I should judge by what little I have seen of him. They visited us once, some years ago, but it has so happened we have never returned their call.'

After some inquiry as to the way, the gray horse and blue pung stopped in front of Doctor Danvers's stately mansion, just as the sun started off back to China again.

'I'll run in and see if the folks are at home,' said Mr. Cobb, while Mr. Wiggin held in the gray horse with all his might, shouting: 'Whoa, whirr! whoa, whirr!' which had the effect of making him prance and rear, thus showing his mettle to the passers-by.

A pert colored girl answered the door-bell, with her head thrown back as though taking an observation of the planetary system, and, saying, 'Doctor Danvers is n't at home, nor Missis either,' was about shutting the door in Mr. Cobb's face.

'Won't they be back to-night?' asked he, before she had time. "Spects likely they will,' answered she indifferently.

'Then I guess I will go in and wait till they come. I suppose I am some connection of Mrs. Danvers,' returned Mr. Cobb, beckoning with his hand to Mr. Wiggin to tie the spirited gray, and follow him in.

Miss Geraldine ushered them into the parlor, somewhat against her will, as was manifested by slamming the door when she made her exit.

'This ere looks comfortable!' ejaculated Mr. Wiggin, depositing his huge bulk in a velvet arm-chair in front of a blazing coal-fire, and drawing an embroidered ottoman for his feet. 'Though I won't say, but the old kitchen and the old kitchen fireplace at home, suit my notions just as well.'

The dainty embroidery agreed with him in that, as the snow began to melt from his heavy boots, and tinge its delicate colors with a dash of yellow ochre. Very possibly Mrs. Danvers thought so when she came in, but she showed no annoyance, welcoming her cousin's husband with graceful ease.

Mr. Cobb made her acquainted with an old neighbor of his, Mr. Wiggin; at least he said he did, and Mrs. Danvers acknowledged it by bowing formally, with elegant dignity.

'A very fine figure of a woman, and dressed out like a poppet; but give me my Polly with a clean calico gown on after all!' said Mr. Wiggin to himself.

'Do you enjoy good health, Mrs. Danvers?' asked Mr. Cobb by way of opening conversation.

Usually not,' replied the lady languidly. 'Indeed for a few days I have been really ill, and was trying to sleep when you rang.'

'I understood the black girl that you had gone away,' said Mr. Cobb in astonishment.

'She only meant that I was not at home to company,' returned Mrs. Danvers with composure.

Oh! ho!' soliloquized Mr. Wiggin, making another mental comparison in favor of Polly and her hospitality.

Do you always keep help?' inquired Mr. Cobb, still bent on sociability. Certainly. We employ two servants, a colored and an Irish girl, beside the Doctor's office-boy, who takes care of the horses.'

At the word horses Mr. Wiggin glanced uneasily toward the window, and Mr. Cobb said: "Then the Doctor has a barn? We've got a horse out here that I expect thinks it is about foddering-time.'

'I mistrust a little hay would n't taste bad to him,' said Mr. Wiggin going toward the door.

'I shall be obliged to ask you to take your horse to one of the hotels, as the Doctor has no extra stalls in his barn,' observed Mrs. Danvers in a courteous tone, as though she were accustomed to sugar-coat her husband's pills.

Mr. Wiggin strode off, shocked at what seemed like inhospitality to him; he would have made a stable of his best bed-room, if he had no other accommodations, for the horse of a guest, but out of respect to Mr. Cobb he made no sign of discomfiture, excepting by a sudden weakening of the muscles of his neck and eyelids, which would have been expressive enough to his faithful Polly.

When he returned with Mr. Cobb from caring for the horse, Mrs. Danvers was not in the parlor, and did not appear until tea-time, which seemed a tedious while coming to men who had faced the north wind all day; and, breakfasting at five in the morning, had eaten nothing but cold doughnuts and cheese since.

The table, covered with elegant damask, was glittering with silver and cut-glass; but alas! the slices of bread were so genteelly thin, that after taking four, Mr. Wiggin found himself with unabated appetite, yet ashamed to take another. A bit of jelly and a slice of fruit-cake with tea from cups as delicate and not much larger than a robin's egg-what was this to a man who could have devoured a quart of baked beans, with pork to match, as you and I would eat a saucer of strawberries?

Doctor Danvers must be excused before tea was well over, for every minute was a diamond to him, and his time was so taken up that really he had seldom an hour to call his own, but they would find Mrs. Danvers much better company. So perhaps they might, if she had not left them to order more coal, and forgotten to return. Biddy came in with the coal-hod directly, (Geraldine was above such coarse work;) and Mr. Cobb, who was a man of friendly, social feelings, with a weakness for all who had come from beyond the sea, commenced conversation with her in this wise:

'How long have you been in the country?'

'And what is it ye'll be afther spakin' about thin to the likes of me?' returned the girl, turning about and spilling a quantity of coal on the carpet, just in the centre of a bunch of white roses.

'I

say, how long is it since you left Ireland?'

'Tin weeks, yer honor. And sure and it's longer by that much than I'm wishing it was! Och! but it would be luck to me if it was niver a day since I left the blissed ould country, the holy Vargin forgive me for doing that same!' "Then you do n't like it as well here as you did in Ireland?'

'Indade and it's the truth ye are spakin', to be sure. I'd give more for one spair of grass that grew in ould Ireland than for ivery tree in Ameriky. It's nothing but hard work that I gets over here, and plinty of it, but when it was at home that I was, I niver had to lift me little finger at any thing, but lived jist like a born leddy of the land, as Patrick O'Flannigan's daughter was, to be sure!'

'Biddy! Biddy! I should like to know who do you think is doing your work in the kitchen while you are entertaining company in the parlor?' said Geraldine, poking her black face through the door.

After this Mr. Cobb and Mr. Wiggin dozed before the fire, until the musical clock on the mantel mentioned that it was nine of the night, when they were aroused by Mrs. Danvers, who came in dressed for a party, and looking as though she had been done up at a laundaly,' Mr. Wiggin told Polly.

'I hope you are entertaining yourselves,' said she. 'The Doctor and I have an engagement this evening, so I trust you will excuse us, and make yourselves comfortable. If you would like to retire before we return, Geraldine will show you your room.'

'I reckon these ere folks would suit Colonel Dempster's taste to a T, but give me good, plain farmer living, and farmer manners,' remarked Mr. Wiggin, as he blew out the gas in his bed-chamber.

I will not waste your time describing the state of the atmosphere in the house, by the time Geraldine had discovered which gas-pipe was leaking, except to say with Mr. Wiggin that 'it scented most killingly.'

'We must try to get off as early as we can this morning,' said he, sometime before cock-crowing, in a hopeless tone. But not half hopeless enough, being accustomed as he was to the thrifty housewifery of Mistress Polly.

It was quite nine o'clock before breakfast was served, and it consisted of waffles and omelets.

'If you ever come our way, you will always find the latch-string out, with me and my wife ready to return this favor, after our plain, poor, homespun style,' said Mr. Wiggin in his whole-souled, hearty fashion, by way of taking leave. As he spoke, he leaned back so heavily in the light dining-chair, that its frail frame-work gave audible expression of dissatisfaction with its huge burden; and when he sprang suddenly up it fell broken at his feet.

'If they do come, they will find chairs that wa' n't made merely to be looked at, and that are stout enough to bear up a mosquito!' said he in monologue.

When he found himself and Mr. Cobb fairly outside the door of Doctor Danvers, he gave a grunt of relief, saying: 'I don't never desire to set foot among your fashionable gentry again, as long as my name is Nehemiah Wiggin! I had rather for the pleasure of it be put to breaking stones on the highway. Now that's so! And I'll tell you one thing more, the first tavern we come to, after leaving this famine place, I shall stop and take a bite of something or other to stay my stomach.'

You would have thought so to have seen him eat. Sausages, ham, potatoes, cabbage, and brown bread, disappeared like vegetation at the time of the plague of locusts in Egypt, until he had made ample amends for all past omission.

It was snowing when they left the hotel, and snowed thicker and faster as the day wore away, but the travellers kept on going hither and thither, as they heard of farmer Dobson's fat two-year old, and farmer somebody else's likely yearlings.

'I've a proposition to make to you,' said Mr. Wiggin, as day-light began to fail. 'I put up at your cousin's last night, what do you say to putting up at my cousin's to-night, neighbor Cobb?'

Neighbor Cobb did n't know as he had any objection, but preferred to leave the matter altogether with him.

'Then it is settled in a few words! We will go,' returned Mr. Wiggin. 'I don't know exactly for positive where cousin Otis lives, but it's somewhere among these ere hills; and one thing I am certain about, we shan't be bothered with any of that 'are nasty-smelling stuff for to light up the rooms with, and there won't be more cloth and silver-ware on the table than is needed, I'll warrant you that. Cousin Otis' folks an't none of your stuck-up gentry, or I am mistaken, though I han't seen none of them these twenty years.'

The chase for cousin Otis' house was a long and treacherous one; but after losing the way several times, and buffeting a fierce north-easter till far into the evening, they came in sight of a dim light, which was supposed to show the haven they sought.

Mr. Wiggin jumped from the sleigh, and, groping his way to the door, rapped loudly with his whip-stalk. This call was answered directly by a woman and two large dogs. The man of few words was not long in making himself known. 'Most obedient, ma'am! Does Otis Wiggin live here? If so, his cousin Nehemiah has come to see him from Massachusetts, and I am the man.'

Before he had finished speaking, the joy of the welcome began. 'Sure enough, Otis! It's your cousin Nehemiah çome from the old Bay State in this storm a purpose to see us; only think on 't!'

Otis had already retired for the night, but his bed-room and kitchen being one, he did not wait to dress before joining his welcoming with his wife's. 6 Well now, I never did! This is better than a gold diamond, an't it, Hepsy ? Who'd a believed it! Clean from the old Bay State. We han't had such a treat as a cousin to see us these ten years, have we, Hepsy?'

Even Mr. Wiggin, with all his power of lung, was overpowered for a while,