"Change it into halfpennies, and she'll have ten!" he said.
Jill and Bumps both brightened up.
"Yes, Bumps, that will be the thing; you must put a halfpenny by, and that will be your tenth. I have two halfpennies you can have instead of your penny."
It needed a good deal of explaining to Bumps before she was completely satisfied. When that was done Jill produced her own purse. She was the richest of the three, for she owned three shillings and sixpence, but how to get a tenth out of it was a puzzle.
Miss Falkner, hearing their eager, excited voices, came to the rescue, and showed Jill that fourpence was the tenth of forty pence, and the two over would go towards the next tenth. Then she delighted her small pupils by producing a pretty scarlet flannel bag which she gave them as a "Tenth" bag. Their united coins rattled in, and though it was only fivepence-halfpenny, they felt as proud of it as if it had been five pounds.
"It's a beginning," said Jill to her governess as she was tucking her up in bed that night. "That's two beginnings I've made since you came here."
Miss Falkner's eyes glistened as she bent over her.
"My little Jill, I shall pray that God may never let you go back from these beginnings, as you call them. Ask Him to help you, dear. It is easier sometimes to make a beginning than go steadily on."
"Yes," said Jill sleepily; "but that's because the Golden City is such a long way off!"