"But I want to stay a little girl," cried Primrose eagerly. "I hate a big hoop and a monstrous topknot that pulls my hair, and a bunch of feathers that makes one look like an Indian sachem."
She made such a pretty pouting mouth, like a rose half-blown, that madam laughed.
"And then one can run around with Patty and tease the boys who sell pink calamus buds, and buy 'Peppery pot, smoking hot.'" She was such a good mimic it sounded exactly like the venders.
"I am afraid I have spoiled thee. But it is thy brother whom we must consider. He may have some rights."
"What rights, indeed, to a rebel maiden who would hate the sight of so many red coats together?"
"Still thou dost love him a little. Surely he is thy nearest kin."
"I can never think whether I love him dearly or only a little. When I pull a daisy out it says only a little. And when I blew a puffy dandelion out to tell me where my true love dwelt, it went south instead of north."
"But the great city. I was there once, years ago. It hath many queer things and reminders of the old Dutch people who settled it. And it has a beautiful river and an island south of it, and a short way out to the ocean."
"As if we did not have our fine and noble Delaware that runs on and up past the Jerseys to the State of New York. And there is our Schuylkill with its peaceful shores and green and flowery banks, now that the British are away, and our beautiful Wissahickon. Nay, I want nothing beyond my own home town, and no one but you and the friends that come here. I will write to Phil and tell him that neither his tongue nor his pen can charm me. And he never says 'thou' latterly."
"But the young people here leave it off, I notice. And thou must not write saucily."