as good as another, but people may take green, or black, or mixed, as
best agrees with their stomachs."

"That's a very dangerous doctrine," said Mrs. Upjohn. "Push it a little
further, and you'll have babes and sucklings living on beef, and their
elders dining on pap."

"Humph!" ejaculated Mrs. Lane again. "If they like it, what's the odds?"

"He-he!" snickered Miss Brooks.

"Well, now," resumed Mr. Hardcastle, "it stands to reason children should
learn to like what their elders have liked before them. That's the only
decent and Christian way of living. And as I said to my son,--to my Dick,
you know" (Mr. Hardcastle had a son of whom he always spoke as if sole
owner of him, and indeed solely responsible for his being),--"'Dick,' I
said, when he spoke disrespectfully of Mr. Webb's prayers,--and Mr. Webb
is a powerful prayer-maker, to be sure,--'Dick,' I said, 'church is like
physic, and the more you don't like it, the more good it does you. And if
you think Mr. Webb's prayers are too long, it's a sign that for your
soul's salvation they ought to be longer.' And I said--"

Mrs. Lane knew by long experience that now or never was the time to stop
Mr. Hardcastle. Once fairly started on the subject of his supposed advice
to Dick on any given occasion, there was no arresting his eloquence. She
started up abruptly from her sewing-machine with her mouth full of pins,
emptying them into her hand as she went. "Those ginger-cookies--" she
mumbled as she passed Mr. Hardcastle. "They ought to be done by this."

A promissory fragrance caught the old gentleman's nostrils as she opened