Corbett, who threatened to
cut off all bread-making unless her wishes were complied with!
Evelyn, who had never seen her brothers-in-law, looked upon them now in
wonder, and she could see their appearance was somewhat of a surprise
to Fred, who had not seen them for many years, and who remembered them
only as the heroes of his childhood days.
They greeted Fred hilariously, but to his wife they spoke timidly, for,
brave as they were in facing Spanish pirates, they were timid to the
point of flight in the presence of women.
As they drove home in the high-boxed wagon, the twins endeavored to
keep up the breezy enthusiasm that had characterized their letters.
They raved about the freedom of the West; they went into fresh raptures
over the view, and almost deranged their respiratory organs in their
praises of the air. They breathed in deep breaths of the ambient
atmosphere, chewed it up with loud smacks of enjoyment, and then blew
it out, snorting like whales. Evelyn, who was not without a sense of
humor, would have enjoyed it all, and laughed _at_ them, even if she
could not laugh with them, if she could have forgotten that they were
her husband's brothers, but it is very hard to see the humorous in the
grotesque behavior of those to whom we are "bound by the ties of duty,"
if not affection.
A good supper at the Black Creek Stopping-House and the hearty
hospitality of Mrs. Corbett restored Evelyn's good spirits. She
noticed, too, that the twins tamed down perceptibly in Mrs.
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