"Mamma," asked Ernestine Alroy, "may I ask the girls to have their next meeting here and take tea with us?"
Mrs. Alroy looked at her daughter with some hesitation as she said: "Ernestine, you know I would like to please you, but have you sufficiently considered the matter? All of your friends are very comfortably situated, and it will be impossible for us to entertain them as they do you. Besides, I cannot be at home until after six, and it will make tea very late."
"I know all that, mamma, but I am sure I can make them have a pleasant time. I do not think we ought to be ashamed of being poor, when we think of the One who 'had not where to lay His head.' For your sake, poor mamma, I wish we had more money; but as for myself, I feel just as happy as if we were worth millions. I don't care a bit whether my friends have money or not, and I don't see why it should make any difference to anybody."
"My poor child!" said her mother, and she sighed as she remembered that at Ernestine's age she had never even seen apartments so poorly furnished as theirs, "you have much to learn; you will find that there are many people in the world to whom it will make a great deal of difference."
"Well, mamma, we don't care for the Madame Mucklegrands of the world, and Winnie Burton and all of her folks are as 'real folks' as any in Mrs. Whitney's book. Do let us have them!"
"Well, dear, I don't exactly like to have you accept hospitalities which we are not willing to return, and if you think you can make it pleasant for your friends, you shall do as you wish."
The next day, therefore, Ernestine told the four girls that her mother sent her compliments and would be much pleased to have them to tea on Friday evening. In the afternoon the girls all accepted, and Fannie said that if agreeable to Mrs. Alroy, her father would call for them at nine o'clock and see them home.
After school that day, as Fannie and Ernestine were walking down Court Street together, they met a little girl, dirty and uncombed, carrying a basket of soiled clothes. Two of the boys of their class, racing wildly down the street, boy-fashion, ran against the child, upset the basket, and the clothes, not being very tightly packed, fell out. There was quite a strong wind, and some of the napkins and handkerchiefs lying loose on top were caught up and sent blowing here, there and everywhere.
The boys ran on, totally indifferent, if not unconscious. The child, commencing to cry, gave chase to the wind-blown articles, and the basket rolled entirely over, and nearly every article fell out.