SCENE I.—_The sitting-room of the COLE family. MARY reading a newspaper.

GRANDMOTHER COLE knitting. AUNT MARTHA crocheting. JACK playing with the balls in AUNT MARTHA’S work-basket._

_Mary Cole._ Oh, Aunt Martha! only hear this! it’s in the _Chronicle_. What a splendid chance! I declare, I’ve a great mind to answer it myself!

_Aunt M._ What have you got hold of now? You’re allez a-making some powerful diskivery somewheres. What now? Something to turn gray eyes black, and blue eyes gray?

_Mary._ No; it’s a matrimonial advertisement. What a splendid fellow this “C. G.” must be!

_Aunt M._ Oh, shaw! A body must be dreadfully put to it, to advertise for a pardner in the newspapers. Thank goodness! I never got in such a strait as that ’er. The Lord has marcyfully kept me thus fur from having any dealings with the male sect, and I trust I shall be presarved to the end.

_Jack Cole._ Didn’t you ever have an offer, Aunt Mattie?

_Aunt M._ (_indignantly_.) Why, Jack Cole! What an idee! I’ve had more chances to change my condition than you’ve got fingers and toes. But I refused ’em all. A single life is the only way to be happy. But it did kinder hurt my feelings to send some of my sparks adrift—they took it so hard. There was Colonel Turner. He lost his wife in June, and the last of August he come over to our ’ouse, and I gave him to understand that he needn’t trouble himself; and he felt so mad that he went rite off and married the Widder Hopkins afore the month was out.

_Jack._ Poor fellow! How he must have felt! And, Aunt Mattie, I notice that Deacon Goodrich looks at you a great deal in meeting, since you’ve got that pink feather on your bonnet. What if he should want you to be a mother to his ten little ones?

_Aunt M._ (_simpering_). Law, Jack Cole! What a dreadful boy you be! (_pinches his ear._) The deacon never thought of such a thing! But if it should please Providence to appoint to me such a fate, I should try and be resigned.

_Granny Cole._ Resigned? Who’s resigned? Not the President, has he? Well, I don’t blame him. I’d resign, too, if I was into his place. Nothing spiles a man’s character so quick as being President or Congress. Yer gran’father got in justice of the peace and chorus, once, and he resigned afore he was elected. Sed he didn’t want his repetition spiled.

_Jack._ Three cheers for Gran’father Cole!

_Granny C._ Cheers? What’s the matter with the cheers, now? Yer father had them bottomed last year, and this year they were new painted. What’s to pay with ’em now?

_Mary_ (_impatiently_). Do listen, all of you, to this advertisement.

_Aunt M._ Mary Cole, I’m sorry your head is so turned with the vanities of this world. Advertising for a pardner in that way is wicked. I hadn’t orter listen to it.

_Mary._ Oh, it won’t hurt you a bit, auntie. (_reads_) “A gentleman of about forty, very fine looking; tall, slender, and fair-haired, with very expressive eyes, and side whiskers, and some property, wishes to make the acquaintance of a young lady with similar qualifications——”

_Jack._ A young lady with expressive eyes and side whiskers——

_Mary._ Do keep quiet, Jack Cole! (_reads_) “With similar qualifications as to good looks and amiable temper, with a view to matrimony. Address, with stamp to pay return postage—C. G., _Scrubtown_; stating when and where an interview may be had.” There! what do you think of that?

_Jack._ Deacon Goodrich to a T. “C. G.” stands for Calvin Goodrich.

_Aunt M._ The land of goodness! Deacon Goodrich, indeed! a pillar of the church! advertising for a wife! No, no, Jack; it can’t be him! He’d never stoop so low!

_Jack._ But if all the women are as hard-hearted as you are, and the poor man needs a wife. Think of his ten little olive plants!

_Granny C._ Plants? Cabbage plants? ’Taint time to set them out yet. Fust of August is plenty airly enuff to set ’em for winter. Cabbages never begin to head till the nights come cold.

_Jack._ Poor Mr. C. G.! Why don’t you answer it, Aunt Mattie; and tell him you’ll darn his stockings for him, and comb that fair hair of his?

_Aunt M._ Jack Cole! if you don’t hold your tongue, I’ll comb your hair for you in a way you won’t like. Me answering one of them low advertisements! _Me_, indeed! I hain’t so eager to get married as some folks I know. Brother Cyrus and I have lived all our lives in maiden meditation, fancy free—the only sensible ones of the family of twelve children; and it’s my idee that we shall continner on in that way.

_Mary._ Why, don’t you believe that Uncle Cyrus would get married if he could?

_Aunt M._ Your Uncle Cyrus! I tell you, Mary Cole, he wouldn’t marry the best woman that ever trod! I’ve hearn him say so a hundred times.

_Mary._ Won’t you answer this advertisement, auntie? I’ll give you a sheet of my nicest gilt-edge note-paper if you will!

_Aunt M._ (_furiously_). If you weren’t so big, Mary Jane Cole, I’d spank you soundly! I vow I would! Me answer it, indeed!

(_Leaves the room in great indignation._)

_Mary._ Look here, Jack. What’ll you bet she won’t reply to that notice?

_Jack._ Nonsense! Wouldn’t she blaze if she could hear you?

_Mary._ I’ll wager my new curled waterfall against your ruby pin that Aunt Mattie replies to Mr. “C. G.” before to-morrow night.

_Jack._ Done! I shall wear a curled waterfall after to-morrow.

_Mary._ No, sir! But I shall wear a ruby pin. Jack, who do you think “C. G.” is?

_Jack._ Really, I do not know; do you? Ah! I know you do, by that look in your eyes. Tell me, that’s a darling.

_Mary._ Not I. I don’t expose secrets to a fellow who tells them all over town. Besides, it would spoil the fun.

_Jack._ Mary, you are the dearest little sister in the world! Tell me, please. (_taking her hands._)

_Mary._ No, sir! You don’t get that out of me. Take care, now. Let go of my hands. I’m going up stairs to keep an eye on Aunt Mattie. She’s gone up now to write an answer to “C. G.” And if there is any fun by-and-by, Jack, if you’re a good boy you shall be there to see.

_Granny C._ To sea? Going to sea? Why, Jack Cole! you haint twenty-one yet, and the sea’s a dreadful place! There’s a sarpint lives in it as big as the Scrubtown meeting-’us’, and whales that swaller folks alive, clothes and all! I read about one in a book a great while ago that swallered a man of the name of Jonah, and he didn’t set well on the critter’s stummuck, and up he come, lively as ever!

(_Curtain falls._)