"What is the matter?" asked her mother.
"The children won't play the way I want them to, and I don't like them any more because I think they are unkind," she answered. "I wish I could go to fairy-land and be a princess, or else that I were a grown-up lady."
"Even grown-up ladies and princesses cannot always have their own way," her mother said.
Elizabeth stood at the window and looked out across the street. Most of the children had gathered there in front of Johnnie Jones's house, and were jumping rope. Elizabeth could hear them counting, and laughing, and talking. She began to feel very lonely. At last she put on her hat again and ran back to join the children.
"If you will let me play with you," she said, "I'll play anything you like."
"All right!" they answered, "and sometimes we'll play what you like."
"And I won't always ask for the best part any more," she said.
"You may have the part you like when it is your turn to choose," they told her.
"I'll turn the rope now," Elizabeth added.
"You turn until some one trips," the others answered.