in the world? I don't believe, Lu, there's another one half so dear and kind and nice. We ought to be ever such good children!"
"Yes, but I'm not," sighed Lulu. "O Gracie, I'd give anything to be as good as you are!"
"Now don't talk so, Lu; you make me feel like a hypocrite; because I'm not good," said Grace.
"You are; at any rate you're a great deal better than I am," asserted Lulu with warmth. "You never disobey papa, or get into a passion; and I don't think you love finery as I do. Gracie, I want that ring yet; oh I should like to have it ever so much! and I oughtn't to want it; it's very selfish, because to buy it would use up money that ought to go to send missionaries to the heathen, or do good to some poor miserable creature; and it's wrong for me to want it, because papa says it wouldn't be good for me; and if I were as good as I ought to be I'd never want anything he doesn't think best for me to have. But, oh dear, how can I help it when I'm so fond of pretty things!"
"Lu," said Grace, softly, "I do believe that if you ask the Lord Jesus to help you to quit wanting it, he will. But if you didn't care for it, it wouldn't be denying yourself to do without it for the sake of the heathen."
"Maybe so; but I don't believe papa would let me have it even if I wouldn't consent to give it up, and begged him ever so hard for it."
"No, I s'pose not, for he loves us too well to give us anything that he thinks will make it harder for us to love and serve God and go to heaven when we die."
"Yes, and of course that's the best way for people to love their children. It's time for me to get up now, but you'd better lie still a little longer."
With that Lulu slipped from the bed, ran back to her room, and kneeling down there, gave thanks for the sleep of the past night, for health and strength, a good home, her dear, kind father to take care of, and provide for her, and love her, and all her many, many comforts and blessings; and confessing her sins, she asked to be forgiven for Jesus' sake, and to have strength given her to do all her duty that day,—to be patient, obedient, industrious, kind and helpful to others and willing to deny herself, especially in the matter of the ring she had been wishing for so ardently.
When the captain came into the apartments of his little daughters for a few minutes chat before breakfast, as was his custom, he found them both neatly dressed and looking bright and happy.
"How are you, my darlings?" he asked, kissing them in turn, then seating himself and drawing them into his arms.
"I think we're both very well, papa," answered Lulu.
"Yes, indeed!" said Grace, "and I'm ever so glad of what Lu's been telling me 'bout the money you are going to give us if we're good, and the choosing 'bout where the other shall go that you're going to give to help send missionaries to the heathen. Thank you for both, dear papa; but don't you think we ought to be good without being paid for it?"
"Yes, I certainly do, my dear little girl; but at the same time I want my children to have the luxury of being able to give something which they have, in some sense, earned for that purpose. I want you to learn in your own experience the truth of the words of the Lord Jesus, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'
"Now while you are so young, not capable of earning much in any other way, your proper business the task of gaining knowledge and skill to fit you for future usefulness, I see no more fitting way than this for you to be furnished with money for religious and benevolent purposes."
"Papa," asked Lulu, "do you think it is never right for anybody to have diamonds or handsome jewelry of any kind?"
"I do not think it my business to judge in such matters for everybody," he answered, caressing her and smiling down tenderly into her eyes; "but I must judge for myself—applying the rules the Bible gives me—and to a great extent for my children also while they are so young."
"Not for Mamma Vi?" Lulu asked, with some little hesitation.
"No; she is my wife, not my child, and old enough to judge for herself."
"She has a great deal of beautiful jewelry," remarked Lulu with an involuntary sigh, "and Grandma Elsie has still more. Rosie asked her once to show it to us children, and she did. Oh she has just the loveliest rings and whole sets of jewelry—pins and ear-rings to match—and chains and bracelets! I'm sure they must be worth a great deal of money; Rosie said they were, and I'm sure Grandma Elsie is a real true Christian—a very, very good one and that Mamma Vi is too."
"And I agree with you in that," was the emphatic reply. "But my daughter and I have nothing to do with deciding their duty for them in regard to this or other things. God does not require that of us; indeed forbids it; 'Judge not, that ye be not judged,' Jesus said.
"But I see plainly that my duty is as I explained it to you last evening, and I thought then you were convinced that it would be selfish and wrong for you and me to spend a large sum for useless ornament that might otherwise be used for the good of our fellow creatures, and the advancement of Christ's kingdom."
"Yes, papa, I was, and I'm trying, and asking God to help me, not to want the ring I asked you for; but I'm afraid it'll take me quite a while to quite stop wishing for it," she sighed.
"You will conquer at length, if you keep on trying and asking for help," he said, giving her a tender kiss.
"A good plan will be to fill your thoughts with other things," he went on; "your lessons while in the school-room, after that you may find it pleasant to begin planning for Christmas gifts to be made or bought for those you love, and others whom you would like to help. I shall give each of you—including Max—as much extra spending money as I did last year."
"Beside all that for benevolence, papa?" they asked in surprise and delight.
"Yes; what I provide you with for benevolence, is something aside from your spending money, which you are at liberty to do with as you please, within certain bounds," he said rising and taking a hand of each as the breakfast bell sounded out its summons to the morning meal.
Misconduct and poor recitations were alike very rare in the school-room at Woodburn; neither found a place there to-day, so that the captain had only commendations to bestow, and they were heartily and gladly given.
The ice and snow had entirely disappeared, and the roads were muddy; too muddy, it was thought, to make travel over them particularly agreeable; but the children obtained sufficient exercise in romping over the wide porches and trotting round the grounds on their ponies.
But in spite of the bad condition of the roads, the Ion carriage drove over early in the afternoon, and Grandma Elsie, Mrs. Elsie Leland—her namesake daughter—Rosie and Evelyn alighted from it. Everybody was delighted to see them, and to hear that they would stay to tea.
"O girls," said Lulu, "come up to my room and take off your things. I've something to tell you," and she looked so gay and happy that they felt quite sure it was something that pleased her greatly.
"I think I can guess what it is," laughed Rosie; "your father has promised you the diamond ring you want so badly."
"No, it isn't that; you may have another guess; but I don't believe you could hit the right thing if you should guess fifty or a hundred times."
"Then I sha'n't try. I give it up. Don't you, Eva?"
"Yes, please tell us, Lu," said Evelyn.
Then Lulu, talking fast and eagerly, repeated to them what she had told to Grace, in bed that morning.
"Oh how nice!" Evelyn exclaimed. "How I should like to be in your place,
Lu!"
"I think it's nice, too," Rosie said, "and I'd like mamma or grandpa to do the same by me. But I'd want my pearls too," she added, laughing. "Mamma's rich enough to give me them, and do all she need do for missions and the poor beside."
"But so very, very much is needed," remarked Evelyn.
"I've read in some of the religious papers, that if every church member would give but a small sum yearly, there would be enough," said Rosie; "and mamma gives hundreds