Don't you want to watch and see everything I do, so's
you can answer if anybody asks you how butter is made?" Elizabeth Ann
understood perfectly what was in Aunt's Abigail's mind, and gave to the
process of butter-making a more alert and aroused attention than she had
ever before given to anything. It was so interesting, too, that in no
time she forgot why she was watching, and was absorbed in the
fascinations of the dairy for their own sake.
She looked in the churn as Aunt Abigail unscrewed the top, and saw the
thick, sour cream separating into buttermilk and tiny golden particles.
"It's gathering," said Aunt Abigail, screwing the lid back on.
"Father'll churn it a little more till it really comes. And you and I
will scald the wooden butter things and get everything ready. You'd
better take that apron there to keep your dress clean."
Wouldn't Aunt Frances have been astonished if she could have looked in
on Elizabeth Ann that very first morning of her stay at the hateful
Putney Farm and have seen her wrapped in a gingham apron, her face
bright with interest, trotting here and there in the stone-floored milk-
room! She was allowed the excitement of pulling out the plug from the
bottom of the churn, and dodged back hastily to escape the gush of
buttermilk spouting into the pail held by Aunt Abigail. And she poured
the water in to wash the butter, and screwed on the top herself, and,
again all herself (for Uncle Henry had gone off as soon as the butter
had "come"), swung the barrel back and forth six or seven times to swish
the water all through the particles of butter.
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