Zillah was quite as devoted a wife and competent a housekeeper as her older sister, but not so wise and faithful a mother. No child was more comfortably or tastefully clad than hers, or had more tender caresses lavished upon it; she meant also to take proper care of his bodily health, and was quite resolved in the long run to train him up in the way he should go; she wanted him to grow up a good man and a strong and healthy one, but in the mean time was often weakly indulgent, to the damage of both his physical and moral natures.
The two sisters, taking work and babies along, were spending a sociable afternoon with their mother.
The little boys, playing about the room, met with an occasional mishap.
Percy tripped on the carpet and fell, striking his head against the leg of the table.
He burst into a cry, and Annis, running to pick him up, exclaimed, "Oh, the poor little dear! that did hurt him, I know."
But Mildred, taking him from her, said in a sprightly tone, "Oh, he's mother's soldier boy; he isn't going to cry for a trifle. But what a blow the table got! poor table!" and she bent down and stroked and patted it pityingly.
Percy stopped crying to echo her words and imitate her action. "Percy didn't doe to hurt oo," he went on; "Percy tiss the p'ace and mate it well," suiting the action to the word.
Then his mother having dried his eyes and given him a kiss, he went back to his play.
Zillah had watched the little scene with interest.
"Is that the way you do?" she said to Mildred. "Don told me that was your way, and I believe, as he says, it is better than mine."