Cephas still adhered to his vegetarian diet, although he pined on it, and the longing for the flesh-pots was great in his soul.

However, he said no more about sorrel pies, for the hardness and the flavor of those which he had prepared had overcome even his zeal of invention.

He ate of them manfully twice; then he ate no more, and he did not inquire how Sarah disposed of them after they had vainly appeared on the table a week.
She, with no pig nor hens to eat them, was forced, with many misgivings as to the waste, to deposit them in the fireplace.
"They actually made good kindlin' wood," she told her sister Sylvia.
"Poor Cephas, he didn't have no more idea than a baby about makin' pies." All Sarah's ire had died away; to-night she set a large plump apple-pie slyly on the table--an apple-pie with ample allowance of lard in the crust thereof; and she felt not the slightest exultation, only honest pleasure, when she saw, without seeming to, Cephas cut off a goodly wedge, after disposing of his dock greens.
"Poor father, I'm real glad he's tastin' of the pie," she whispered to Charlotte in the pantry; "greens ain't very fillin'." Charlotte smiled, absently.

Presently she slipped into the best room and lighted the candles.

"You expectin' of anybody to-night ?" her mother asked, when she came out.
"I didn't know but somebody might come," Charlotte replied, evasively.