Then she made a rule that Anna Maria was not to speak to any person in the school excepting her teacher. And what was the result? At all hours of the day, in the midst of the most important business, Miss Matilda would be interrupted with talk similar to the following:
"Oh, teacher, may I speak to you one minute?"
"Certainly. What is it?"
"I just want to tell you about my cousin Susie's new doll. You ought to see it; it is perfectly splendid!—wax face and hands and feet, and real hair, and—"
"Anna Maria, have I not told you repeatedly that you were not to speak about anything except what was absolutely necessary? Now do you think that such conversation is necessary?"
Anna Maria hung her head a little, and then she said, in a sort of apologetic way, "Well, teacher, it may not seem so, but really it is necessary for me. You see, I get thinking about something, and I can't stop thinking about it until I have told it to somebody else."
"Well, and when you have relieved your mind in this manner, at the expense of peace and quiet to the whole school, what then?"
"Oh, then I think about something else."
"Yes, and then you wish to chatter about that."
"But really, teacher, I can't help it. I always was so. Grandma says I talk more than all the rest of the family put together. In fact, the family have to be quiet because I talk so much. I always did, you know. It is one of those things that can't be altered."