'You are more useful to my mother, and more pleasant with her than
I can ever be,' Louisa resumed. 'You are pleasanter to yourself,
than I am to myself.'
'But, if you please, Miss Louisa,' Sissy pleaded, 'I am - O so
stupid!'
Louisa, with a brighter laugh than usual, told her she would be
wiser by-and-by.
'You don't know,' said Sissy, half crying, 'what a stupid girl I
am. All through school hours I make mistakes. Mr. and Mrs.
M'Choakumchild call me up, over and over again, regularly to make
mistakes. I can't help them. They seem to come natural to me.'
'Mr. and Mrs. M'Choakumchild never make any mistakes themselves, I
suppose, Sissy?'
'O no!' she eagerly returned. 'They know everything.'
'Tell me some of your mistakes.'
'I am almost ashamed,' said Sissy, with reluctance. 'But to-day,
for instance, Mr. M'Choakumchild was explaining to us about Natural
Prosperity.'
'National, I think it must have been,' observed Louisa.
'Yes, it was. - But isn't it the same?' she timidly asked.
'You had better say, National, as he said so,' returned Louisa,
with her dry reserve.
'National Prosperity. And he said, Now, this schoolroom is a
Nation. And in this nation, there are fifty millions of money.
Isn't this a prosperous nation? Girl number twenty, isn't this a
prosperous nation, and a'n't you in a thriving state?'
'What did you say?' asked Louisa.
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