"Hottentot, eh?" granddad Lawrence repeated, whimsically.
He had me upon his knee, and as he spoke he turned my face toward his, and regarded it with much apparent interest. I gazed back at him wistfully. He was company, and it was very hard that company should hear me called a Hottentot. I was sure that I did not look like that dreadful name which had suddenly sprung upon grandmother's lips. It had such an awful sound!
"She's no worse than other children," my mother urged, in defence.
She might blame me herself, but when grandmother Harcourt looked over her spectacles and invented names my mother was sure to grow angry.
"It seems to me that I've heard about Hottentots before," granddad Lawrence went on, nodding his head. "They're very fond of candy, Hottentots are, and they like their own way. Yes, they like their own way."
"Not any more than other children," my mother said again. "Rhoda gets into mischief solely because she has nothing to do."
"Why don't you send her to school?" granddad Lawrence asked. "She is seven years old."
"Oh, I couldn't send her to school!" my mother cried, anxiously.
"No, not yet," grandmother protested, in her turn.