Fifty, sixty, or seventy,
she might be--not more than the last, not less than the
first--though her usual answer to any circuitous inquiry as to
her age was now (what it had been for many years past), "I'm
feared I shall never see thirty again."
Then as to the house. It was not one where the sitting-rooms are
refurnished every two or three years; not now, even (since Ruth
came to share their living) a place where, as an article grew
shabby or worn, a new one was purchased. The furniture looked
poor, and the carpets almost threadbare; but there was such a
dainty spirit of cleanliness abroad, such exquisite neatness of
repair, and altogether so bright and cheerful a look about the
rooms--everything so above-board--no shifts to conceal poverty
under flimsy ornament--that many a splendid drawing-room would
give less pleasure to those who could see evidences of character
in inanimate things. But whatever poverty there might be in the
house, there was full luxuriance in the little square
wall-encircled garden, on two sides of which the parlour and
kitchen looked. The laburnum-tree, which when Ruth came was like
a twig stuck into the ground, was now a golden glory in spring,
and a pleasant shade in summer. The wild hop, that Mr. Benson had
brought home from one of his country rambles, and planted by the
parlour-window, while Leonard was yet a baby in his mother's
arms, was now a garland over the casement, hanging down long
tendrils, that waved in the breezes, and threw pleasant shadows
and traceries, like some old Bacchanalian carving, on the
parlour-walls, at "morn or dusky eve.
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