Tuesday, all day, she cut patterns of skirts, and polonaises, and basques, and fichus, and walking jackets, all as fanciful as possible, bearing in mind the temper of her seamstress.
On Wednesday she went over to Mintie, carrying the bundles and her own walnut cutting board.
And when Mintie had looked at the great army of curly-pated dolls, with their naked little kid bodies, every one of them wearing the same rosy smile, and had laid all the lustrous silky velvets to her cheek, and had sheened the silks over her knee, and had delighted with the laces and the iris ribbons, she did smile, the first sunny smile of her blighted life, I do believe; and she said she should be very, very happy, and that she should dress no two dolls alike; and she never mentioned her wages at all.
But after Miss Chatty had unfolded her plan, and told her how well she was to be paid, Mintie became cross again. She said after the dolls were done it was a shame for ragged children to have them, and they would have to be taken from her house to be distributed, for she couldn’t, and wouldn’t, bear the sight of such creatures!
But in what manner the Doll Mission was organized, and how the lovely missionaries did their work, and whether the Angel really stopped weeping, will make another long story; and it will be still more beautiful than this and the other.
THE LITTLE PARSNIP-MAN.
BY E. F.