“You might have a little more consideration, especially when you usurp the prerogative of a god and distribute good and evil with such authority.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that you always serve the boys first and the girls after, whilst in all ages and countries ladies are served first.”
She began to laugh heartily.
“But I see no ladies here, only children, who have no sex in my eyes, for I love them all equally. To-day, and for several days past, I have helped Cecchino and Pietro first because they are near me. When Maria was in Cecchino’s place I helped her first. What! ought we to teach children, in their earliest age of innocence, etiquette and the laws of society? This seems to me the height of absurdity.”
“As to the absurdity of the idea, that is not the question. It is a matter of justice. You always prefer the boys.”
“And you the girls, so we are quits.”
“But look round and read your condemnation in the plates of the children. You not only help the boys first, but you give them more.”
“Of course; they are older!”