"Come, dear! Please hurry, for I want you to run to the grocery before
breakfast!" Mamma called from the foot of the stairs.

"Oh dear!" exclaimed Marjorie, "I don't want to get up!" and keeping her
head on the pillow just as long as she could Marjorie crawled out of bed
backwards.

Her clothes were scattered about the room and her stockings were turned
inside out. Her dress would not fasten and she cried, so that Mamma had
to come upstairs and dress her.

So you see Marjorie's day began all wrong, for everything started
topsy-turvy.

"Now hurry, dear!" Mamma said as she handed Marjorie the basket.

Marjorie slammed the door as she went out and she was so cross she
did not notice the beautiful sunshine nor hear the pretty songs which
greeted her from the tree tops.

"It's so far to the old store!" Marjorie grumbled to herself, as she
pouted her pretty lips and shuffled her feet along the path.

"Hello, Marjorie!" laughed a merry voice.

Marjorie saw a queer little elf sitting upon a stone at the side of the
road. His little green suit was so near the color of the leaves Marjorie
could scarcely distinguish him from the foliage. He wore a funny little
pointed cap of a brilliant red, and sticking in it was a long yellow