After tea she and her brothers played games for some time; then Mrs. Robertson took her mending-basket, which was always very full, and Katie got her thimble and helped, while Eric read aloud from a book of "Stories from History." And so closed the first day of Katie Robertson's "factory life."
CHAPTER IV.
THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL.
Miss Etta Mountjoy was a young lady of the period. She was the youngest of Mr. Mountjoy's children, and the baby and pet of all. Her mother died when she was about five years old, and since then she had always done exactly as she pleased; her father would not control her, and her eldest sister, who took charge of the family in her mother's place, could not. It was well that the girl had no evil tendencies and was, upon the whole, well-principled, warm-hearted, and good-natured, or she might have gone very grievously astray. As it was, she was now at seventeen a bright butterfly, flitting from one to another of the flowers of life, and sipping as much honey as she could from each. She was fond of all sorts of bright, pretty things, handsome clothes and jewelry included. She liked to sing and she liked to dance, to go to parties when there were any, and to attend concerts and theatres when she went to town; in a word, she was fond of "having a good time," as Americans express it, whenever and wherever she could get a chance.
Nor did Miss Etta mind work. She was a girl of energy, who would willingly walk miles to attend a picnic or climb a mountain, and she did not hesitate to work for hours on a trimming for her dress, or even some more useful piece of sewing. She was always having furores for something; at one time it was gardening, when she coaxed her father to have a good-sized piece of ground dug up and laid out for her, and actually raised, not flowers, as one would expect, but quite respectable vegetables, hoeing the beans, corn, and cabbages herself, and weeding out the cucumbers, lettuce, and radishes with persistent fidelity.
At another time she had a poultry-mania, and a chicken-house with the most approved nests, warming-apparatus, etc., was constructed for the little lady, and here she daily set the hens, fed the chickens, and collected the eggs, selling them to her father at exorbitant prices. Again, cooking absorbed her time and gave occupation to her energies; and the family were treated to strange compounds of her concocting, while the old servant who reigned supreme in the kitchen was in the depths of despair at the number of dishes and pans she was called upon to clear up, the waste and breakage that went on, and the general disorganization of her lifelong arrangements.
Happily, or unhappily, these moods never were of long duration. The reading-mania lasted just long enough for a handsome bookcase to be stocked with histories, biographies, etc.; a few volumes of poems were dipped into, several novels read, and a big history attacked, when the mood changed into a passion for skating, and the remainder of the winter was consumed in preparing a fancy costume, getting the most approved club-skates, and learning to keep upright upon them; but by the time so much was accomplished, the ice broke up and Miss Etta was obliged to find some other occupation. Art came next in the list of the girl's absorbing avocations. A studio was fitted up, canvas stretched upon easels, pencils sharpened, and quite a creditable beginning made upon some pictures which showed considerable native taste and ability.
Just now Sunday-school teaching had taken the place of all other things, and Etta Mountjoy devoted the energies of her many-sided nature to her class. There had been more than one person opposed to entrusting so sacred a work to so light-minded and trivial a girl. Her brother James considered it nothing short of sacrilege, and her oldest sister Eunice reasoned with her very gravely, and tried to show her that, in order to teach the truths of God, one should have some personal knowledge of them, and that the only acceptable motive for religious work was a sincere desire to please God and benefit the souls of those whom Christ came to save. But Etta was not accustomed to be guided by her brother and sister; she went to her father, told him she wanted to take a class in Sunday-school, and of course he said "Yes." Then she went to the superintendent and made known her request, saying it was at her father's desire, which, as he was book-keeper at the paper-mill, would, she knew, have great weight.
Mr. Scoville paused, hesitated, and finally resolved to consult the pastor, promising Etta her answer before Sunday came round. He would have given an unqualified refusal had the petitioner been any one else than his employer's daughter.
Mr. Morven, the pastor, however, thought differently. He had known the young girl ever since she was a very little one; he knew there was no positive evil in her, and though he had not heretofore suspected her of any serious thought, he looked upon her request as an indication of good, and said that perhaps the very familiarity with sacred things which teaching a Sunday-school class would necessitate might be as beneficial to the teacher as to the scholars. So Mr. Scoville, though rather against his better judgment, sent a note to Miss Etta granting her request, having in his mind a certain class of little ones just out of the infant class, the teacher of which had announced her intention of leaving the school. When he went to see this teacher, however, he found she had changed her mind, and there was no other class available except one composed of seven "big girls," of whom Katie Robertson was one. Of course, Mr. Scoville could not go back on his word, so Miss Etta Mountjoy was formally installed as teacher of one of the most important classes of the school.