Strange , ai n't it , how folks seem to resent anyone being born a mite cleverer than they be . '' Doctor Dave , who had a forty years ' feud with the over-harbor people , laughed and subsided . `` Who lives in that brilliant emerald house about half a mile up the road ? '' asked Gilbert . Captain Jim smiled delightedly . `` Miss Cornelia Bryant . She 'll likely be over to see you soon , seeing you 're Presbyterians . If you were Methodists she would n't come at all . Cornelia has a holy horror of Methodists . '' `` She 's quite a character , '' chuckled Doctor Dave . `` A most inveterate man-hater ! '' `` Sour grapes ? '' queried Gilbert , laughing . `` No , 't is n't sour grapes , '' answered Captain Jim seriously . `` Cornelia could have had her pick when she was young . Even yet she 's only to say the word to see the old widowers jump . She jest seems to have been born with a sort of chronic spite agin men and Methodists . She 's got the bitterest tongue and the kindest heart in Four Winds . Wherever there 's any trouble , that woman is there , doing everything to help in the tenderest way . She never says a harsh word about another woman , and if she likes to card us poor scalawags of men down I reckon our tough old hides can stand it . ''
`` She always speaks well of you , Captain XXXXX , '' said Mrs. Doctor .
't Bryant Dave Gilbert Jim Methodists man-hater scalawags widowers years