Kitty was slim and straight and graceful as a young fawn, Nancy swept down the middle of the barn floor like a flower borne by the breeze.  She was Youth, Hope, Joy incarnate!  She had washed the dishes that night, would wash them again in the morning, but what of that?  What mattered it that the years just ahead (for aught she knew to the contrary) were full of self-denial and economy?  Was she not seventeen?  Anything was possible at seventeen!  What if the world was to be a work-a-day world?  There was music and laughter in it as well as work, and there was love in it, too, oceans of love, so why not trip and be merry and guide one’s young partner safely through the difficult mazes of the dance and bring him out flushed and triumphant, to receive mother’s laughing compliments?

Everybody was dancing The Tempest in his or her own fashion, thought the Admiral, looking on.  Mrs. Popham was grave, even gloomy from the waist up, but incredibly lively from the waist down, moving with the precision of machinery, while her partner, a bricklayer from Beulah Centre, engaged the attention of the entire company by his wonderful steps.  She was fully up to time too, you may be sure, as her rival, Mrs. Bill Harmon, was opposite her in the set.  Lallie Joy, clad in one of Kathleen’s dresses, her hair dressed by Julia, was a daily attendant at the Vacation School, but five weeks of steady instruction had not sufficed to make her sure of ladies’ grand chain.  Olive moved like a shy little wild thing, with a bending head and a grace all her own, while Gilbert had great ease and distinction.

There was a brief interval for ice cream, accompanied by marble cake, gold cake, silver cake, election cake, sponge cake, cup cake, citron cake, and White Mountain cake, and while it was being eaten, Susie Bennett played The Sliding Waltz, The Maiden’s Prayer, and Listen to the Mocking Bird with variations; variations requiring almost supernatural celerity.

“I guess there ain’t many that can touch Sutey at the piano!” said Osh Popham, who sat beside the Admiral.  “Have you seen anybody in the cities that could play any faster’n she can?  And Jo you ever ketch her landin’ on a black note when she started for a white one?  I guess not!”

“You are right!” replied the Admiral, “and now there seems to be a general demand for you.  What are they requesting you to do,—­fly?”

“That’s it,” said Osh.  “Mis’ Carey, will you play for me?  Maria, you can go into the carriage house if you don’t want to be disgraced.”

  “Come, my beloved, haste away,
  Cut short the hours of thy delay. 
  Fly like a youthful hart or roe
  Over the hills where spices grow.”

At length the strains of the favorite old tune faded on the ears of the delighted audience.  Then they had The Portland Fancy and The Irish Washerwoman and The College Hornpipe, and at last the clock in the carriage house struck midnight and the guests departed in groups of twos and threes and fours, their cheerful voices sounding far down the village street.