"Oh my," she said, "the stitch is so naughty! It is running away! What shall I do?"
You see, there were five stitches on the knitting needle, and Annie's little fat fingers had hard work to keep them there.
So her kind mamma showed her very carefully how to pull a stitch through with the other needle, before it had time to be off on its travels; and the dear little child, with a bright smile, kissed her mother, and said, "It is all tight now; oh, how glad I am!" And she put out her chubby little leg to try how much larger that celebrated stitch had made the garter.
Presently she cried out again, "Oh, mamma, here's a stitch all climbed up, and another all rolled down; and one is so little I can't see his eye to poke the needle through. Oh, what a bad children!"
Her mother laughed at this funny speech, and said pleasantly, "'Try, try again,' ilken Annie." Then she pulled and twitched at the "bad children-stitches;" and once more Annie sat down to knit, singing, with a pretty little bird's note—
"'Tis a lesson you should heed:
Try, try again;
If at first you don't succeed,
Try, try again."
Of course you know all of this pretty little song, don't you? Just sing it now.
By and by the little girl and her mother went down to luncheon; and there, on the table, were such lots of nice cream and raspberries, and white home-made bread! Oh! how I wish all the darling children in the world could have such a delicious lunch—so much better for them than pies or a whole bushel of sugar candy.
When this nice lunch was over, Annie's mother said, "My little darling, I am going to New York to buy a chest of tea, and hire a cook, besides taking a trunk which belongs to a friend. You must keep house for me, dear; and if any company comes, behave very politely to them, and take off their bonnets, and talk to them, and ask them to stay till I come home."
"So ilken Annie will, mamma," she answered; "but I'll tell them they mustn't pull off their shoes and stockings and paddle in the lake, saying, 'quack,' and making believe they are a duck, like brother did. I'll tell them that's naughty, won't I?"