There, reclined upon the grass, beneath the flowering boughs of a patriarch tree, Miss Paulina ere long comes upon the oddly matched pair. Peter, wreathed with buttercups and dandelions, and wearing his flowery honours like another "Bottom," sits beside his "Titania," who in fond infatuation "His amiable cheek doth coy."
"Pity," thinks the intruder, "to spoil so quaint a picture." The sun is, however, already low, and she calls her darling in from the dewfall. In the kitchen, Harmy has made reluctant preparations for Peter's inner man; grimly remarking to Mandy Ann (who has meantime returned from an errand at the store) that "it does go agin' her, to put on span clean table-cloths for sich creeturs, an' to waste good vittels where they can't no how be sensed." A convict being, at Mandy Ann's estimate, an ineligible, if not dangerous guest, as Peter and May-blossom enter at one door, she vanishes by another. Harmy dons her cape-bonnet, and marches stiffly into the kitchen garden, leaving the disreputable visitor to his child hostess.
Peter Floome had not figured at a tea-drinking for many a long year, and, naturally, his company manners are somewhat rusty. Possibly, his table etiquette (or, rather, his entire lack of it) might have shocked his too partial entertainer (who, with fine innate courtesy, has laid herself a cup and plate, and is keeping her guest in countenance by taking her own tea with him), had not his evident satisfaction in the meal entirely engrossed her mind, for (Harmy to the contrary, notwithstanding) Peter is inherently inclined to "sense good vittels." It is quaintly picturesque, this tea-drinking of "Bottom" and "Titania;" this odd contrast of loutishness and elegance, although (as I grieve to record) "Bottom" does absolutely ignore the butter-knife; does thrust his wet spoon into the sugar bowl; and, vigourously blowing his hot tea, in scorn of popular prejudice, lap the same from his slopping saucer, and shovel in the apple sauce with his knife-blade. "Titania's" pretty efforts to put "Bottom" at his ease are, indeed, a thing to behold; for, conscious of his own want of keeping with the unwonted occasion, Peter is, to the very last degree, awkward and abashed. Nevertheless, the encouraging smiles of his small hostess carry him victoriously to the end of this harrowing experience. Other social exigencies yet await this much-tried man. Directly after tea, he is taken by May-blossom to that inner sanctuary, Miss Parker's parlour, where, amid oppressively elegant surroundings, he is further weighed to earth by the disparaging sense of his own abjectness.