"I was thinking so much more about being wise and knowing a great deal than about being good and a help to mamma," continued Nellie, not offended, though she had winced a little at Carrie's plain speaking, "that it seems to me now that I was almost as naughty as--as"--
"As I was to keep the mice?" said Carrie.
"Yes, as you were to keep the mice. I don't think I thought any more about mamma than you did, and I know several times I made a good deal of trouble for her which might have been helped if I had been more careful."
"You've quite given up your Bible subjects, haven't you?" asked Carrie.
"Yes, I made up my mind to be contented with those I had. They would show Miss Ashton I had thought of what she said, but I know she would think it was right for me to leave them. I've made up my mind too, Carrie, not to be so very anxious about my books and studies."
"Nellie, what'll make me grow very fast?"
"I don't know," said Nellie: "what do you want to grow very fast for?"
"So I can have a birdie," said Daisy. "Papa said I was too little now, least he said he would give me one when I was bigger. If I was to plant myse'f and then pour water on my foots like they do on the flowers' foots, then wouldn't I grow pretty fast?"
"No," said Nellie, "you'd only be all wet and muddy, and then you'd be sick."
"Oh, I do want a birdie so," she said. "I'd love my birdie more'n my white mice; oh! a great deal more. Nellie, if I was a birdie, or a white mouse, would you love me the most?"
"I'd love you whatever you were," said Nellie, turning to kiss the sweet, dimpled cheek beside her: "I couldn't help it."
"If I was an ugly bug crawling about, would you love me?" questioned Daisy.
"Nellie, if I was that ugly bug crawling about, would you smash me?"
"Not if you were not doing any harm," said Nellie. "That would be cruel."
"I'm glad," said Daisy, with unmistakable signs of relief in the assurance. "I wouldn't like my sister to smash me even if I was a bug. Nellie, mamma said God sometimes made people sorry 'cause He thought it was good for 'em to make 'em better: does He send bugs and spiders 'cause it is good for 'em too, and birdies just to make 'em glad?"
Daisy's questions were sometimes quite beyond Nellie's powers of answering: indeed they often puzzled older and wiser people. But she tried to explain to her little sister that even bugs and spiders were made for some good purpose; and after this Daisy looked with more respect upon those obnoxious creatures, and was even upon one occasion heard to say,--