Aunt Madge's Story

? I cannot remember the events of my life in right order, so I shall have to tell them as t

te auntie, and very humble servant. I was as restless a baby as ever sat on a papa's knee and was trotted to "Boston." When I cried

er woman, with glittering black eyes, was more shocked by me than words can tell. She said your grandma "spoiled me by baby-talk; it was very wrong to let little ones hear baby-talk. If she had had the care o

grandpa's pet name was Totty-wax; only, if I joggled t

ten forgot the thinking altogether. Margaret means Daisy; but if I was like any flower at all, I should say it was "the lady in the bower." You know it, Prudy, how it peeps out from a tangle of little tendrils? Just so I peeped out, and was dimly seen,

the gate, and a man said, 'Who's that funny little fel

behind. The other girls had braids as well as I; but, alas! mine were not straight like theirs; they quirled ove

at think, Fly? When I was lying in the cradle I found my hands one day, and I shouldn't wonder if I thought they were two weeny babies come visiting; what do you suppose? Of course I didn't know they belonged to me, but I stared at them, and tried to talk. And from that time until I was a great girl, as much as five years ol

ked to her, and if I picked a flower I kissed

aid I might go somewhere, and off I would go, thinking, as I crept along by the fence, b

e alwa

arried her off in her pocket. I told my little friend Ruphelle so much about this other Marjie that she believed in her, and after a while I believed in her myse

r did not know where to draw the line between fairy stories and lies. Once I ran away, a

twas. There's a little girl in this town looks jus' like me; has hair jus' the sa

t in the face and tell such a lie; but the more she sai

sleeps in a big hole. Didn't y

ud on her apron. She was as real to me as some of the little girls I met on the st

with a child that had such a habit of

oesn't know

nswered, "But Maria

ed my head. When mother took me out of the closet, and asked, "Would I be a better girl?" I generally said, "Yes um," very promptly, and cried behind my yellow h

f, in addition to running away, mother whipped me

another wrong story, I shall whip you ha

t I very soon went and told Ruphelle that my mamma had silk dresses, spangled with stars; "kep' 'em locked into a trunk; did

at a w

im, and asked what kind of a whopper I had

l switch in her hand. Poor woman! She wished she had not promised to use it again, for she began to think it was all in vain. But she must n

own stairs, but I said something so stra

h the tears all dried off. "You said you'd whip me harder, but you whipp

to satisfy my ideas of justice; but that was the last time she used the switch for many a long day. Not that I stopped telling marvel