"What nonsense!" exclaimed Dick, impatiently; "if they're good enough company for us, they're surely good enough company for you."
"Both my dear mother and Duty have warned me against such companions; I may not go where they go."
"Stay at home then—no one wants you!" exclaimed Dick, who, puffed up as he was by self-confidence, could not endure the slightest opposition. "Set yourself up for a model child—lame, plain, and stupid as you are."
Poor Nelly's heart swelled as if it would burst at such undeserved rudeness from her brother. She returned, however, no angry word, but silently and quietly quitted the place. Her eyes were so much dimmed by tears, that she could scarcely see her way back to her own little cottage.
"It was a shame in me to speak so to Nelly," exclaimed Dick, who repented of his unkind speech almost as soon as he had uttered it.
"You had better tell her so," said Matty, who, though frivolous and careless, was not an ill-natured girl.
Dick turned to follow Nelly, and would doubtless have made all things smooth with his sister, had he not met dark Pride at the door.
Ah, dear reader, have you never been stopped by Pride when going to beg forgiveness of one to whom you knew that you had done a wrong, and especially when that injured party was younger and less clever than yourself?
Dick would not demean himself, as he called it, in the presence of watchful Pride, by telling his little sister that he was sorry for having hurt her feelings. Pride came to talk about the fireworks, and, in eager conversation with him, thoughtless Dick soon forgot the wound which his overbearing temper had inflicted upon a gentle and loving heart.