"Too much talk! too much talk!" cried Aunt Susan's voice from the
adjoining kitchen. "Hands lag when tongues wag; wherefore do your
work in silence. Is that almond paste ready, Keren Happuch? Then
bring it quickly hither; and your manchet and sugar, Keziah, for
the skins are ready to be stuffed."

And as the girls obediently brought the required ingredients, they
found themselves in a long, low room, at the end of which a huge
fire burned in a somewhat primitive stove, whilst a tall, angular,
and powerful-looking dame, with her long upper robe well tucked up,
and her gray hair pushed tightly away beneath a severe-looking
coif, was superintending a number of culinary tasks, Jemima and a
serving wench obeying the glance of her eye and the turn of her
hand with the precision of long practice.

Certainly it was plain that Martin Holt's guests would not starve
that night. The herring pie was only the crowning delicacy of the
board, which was to groan beneath a variety of appetizing dishes.
The Puritans were a temperate race, and the baneful habit of sack
drinking at all hours, of perpetual pledgings and toastings, and
the large consumption of fiery liquors, was at a discount in their
houses; but they nevertheless liked a good table as well as the
rest of their kind, and saw no hurt in sitting down to a generously
supplied board, whilst they made up for their abstemiousness in the
matter of liquor by the healthy and voracious appetite which
speedily caused the good cheer to melt away.

Mistress Susan was so intent on her preparations that she scarcely
let her nieces pause to eat their frugal midday dinner. Martin