I never thought about Northfield except to thank goodness I 'd escaped from it , and John Henry and I were as happy as a king and queen . Then after awhile my activities began to sprout and branch out , and the direction they took was boys . Carleton was full of boys , like all the western towns , overflowing with them as you might say , young fellows just let loose from home and mother , some of them dying of homesickness and some of them beginning to run wild and get into risky ways , some of them smart and some of them lazy , some ugly and some handsome ; but all of them boys , lovable , rollicking boys , with the makings of good men in them if there was anybody to take hold of them and cut the pattern right , but liable to be spoiled just because there was n't anybody . Well , I did what I could . It began with John Henry bringing home some of them that worked in his office to spend the evening now and again , and they told other fellows and asked leave to bring them in too . And before long it got to be that there never was an evening there was n't some of them there , `` Aunt-Pattying '' me . I told them from the start I would not be called Miss. . When a woman has been Miss for forty-five years she gets tired of it . So Aunt Patty it was , and Aunt Patty it remained , and I loved all those dear boys as if they 'd been my own . They told me all their troubles , and I mothered them and cheered them up and scolded them , and finally topped off with a jolly good supper ; for , talk as you like , you ca n't preach much good into a boy if he 's got an aching void in his stomach . Fill that up with tasty victuals , and then you can do something with his spiritual nature . If a boy is well stuffed with good things and then wo n't listen to advice , you might as well stop wasting your breath on him , because there is something radically wrong with him . Probably his grandfather had dyspepsia . And a dyspeptic ancestor is worse for a boy than predestination , in my opinion . Anyway , most of my boys took to going to church and Bible class of their own accord , after I 'd been their aunt for awhile . The young minister thought it was all his doings , and I let him think so to keep him cheered up . He was a nice boy himself , and often dropped in of an evening too ; but I never would let him talk theology until after supper . His views always seemed so much mellower then , and did n't puzzle the other boys more than was wholesome for them . This went on for five glorious years , the only years of my life I 'd ever lived , and then came , as I thought , the end of everything . John Henry took typhoid and died .
At first that was all I could think of ; and when I got so that I could think XXXXX other things , there was , as I have said , nothing for me to do but go back east .
as because for in like of on than that to