“When I’m at home, I eat six pints of pea-nuts a day—father buys them by the ton,” said another.
“Speaking of pickles—do you know what she eats them for?” inquired another girl. “I can tell you—she thinks they make her look pale and genteel. She eats chalk, and slate pencils, too—I’ve seen her do it, many a time.”
“Yes,” added Kate Sedgwick, who was one of the group, “and you ought to see her drink vinegar, too. Why, she makes nothing of drinking a whole cup full of clear vinegar at one draught.”
“I do think she is the most hateful thing”——
“Come, girls, this is scandal,” interposed Jessie, “let us talk about something else.”
“Scandal?—no, this is nothing but the truth, and telling the truth isn’t scandal,” replied Kate.
“I think it is, very often,” replied Jessie.
“Well, I don’t call telling the truth talking scandal, and I never heard anybody say it was, before,” remarked another girl, one of the largest in the school. “If a girl really eats chalk and slate pencils, and drinks vinegar, to make herself look genteel, it isn’t scandal to tell of it.”
The other girls in the group all took the same ground, and Jessie was at least half convinced she was in the wrong. She made no attempt to argue the point, but sought to give the matter a practical turn, by saying:—
“Well, I never hear a lot of girls talking about another one behind her back, without having a suspicion that I shall be served the same way, as soon as I am out of hearing. Abby was here a few moments ago, and we were all on good terms with her, and she spoke kindly to us. But every tongue is against her, as soon as her back is turned. It seems to me there is something inconsistent and unkind in this. If we had any criticisms to make on what she said, would it not have been better to have made them to her face?”