"
These objects were tastefully decorated with the national colors.
In fact, no modern aesthete could have arranged a symbolic symphony
of grief and glory with any more fidelity to an ideal than Diadema Bascom,
in working out her scheme of red, white, and blue.
Rows of ripening tomatoes lay along the ledges of the windows,
and a tortoise-shell cat snoozed on one of the broad sills.
The tall clock in the corner ticked peacefully. Priscilla Hollis
never tired of looking at the jolly red-cheeked moon, the group
of stars on a blue ground, the trig little ship, the old house,
and the jolly moon again, creeping one after another across the open
space at the top.
Jot Bascom was out, as usual, gathering statistics of
the last horse trade; little Jot was building "stickin'" houses
in the barn; Priscilla was sewing long strips for braiding;
while Diadema sat at the drawing-in frame, hook in hand,
and a large basket of cut rags by her side.
Not many weeks before she had paid one of her periodical
visits to the attic. No housekeeper in Pleasant River save
Mrs.
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