eat it. But think how disagreeable it sounds to hear you say such a
thing."

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I am too cold."

"Yes, dear, I know you are. So is mamma. But we shall not feel any warmer
for saying so. We must wait till the fire burns better; and the time will
seem twice as long if we grumble."

"Oh, mamma! mamma! My steam-engine is all spoiled. It won't run. I hate
things that wind up!"

"But, my dear little boy, don't grumble so! What would you think if mamma
were to say, 'Oh, dear! oh, dear! My little boy's stockings are full of
holes. How I hate to mend stockings!' and, 'Oh, dear! oh, dear! My little
boy has upset my work-box! I hate little boys'?"

How they look steadily into your eyes for a minute,--the honest,
reasonable little souls!--when you say such things to them; and then run
off with a laugh, lifted up, for that time, by your fitly spoken words of
help.

Oh! if the world could only stop long enough for one generation of
mothers to be made all right, what a millennium could be begun in thirty
years!

"But, mamma, you are grumbling yourself at me because I grumbled!" says a
quick-witted darling not ten years old. Ah! never shall any weak spot in
our armor escape the keen eyes of these little ones.