Mother, "I am come to say that your Governess told me yesterday you
had been so very good for a long time over all that you have had to
do, that I have arranged for your having a holiday and a treat to-day,
and several of your young friends are coming to see you. Among them is
Aurora, the granddaughter of the old lady in spectacles, who, just
before she was going away at night, recollected you, and began to look
for you behind her chair."

"Oh what a goose, Mamma!" "No, not a goose, my dear--only an oddity,
but a very kind one too--for she desired me to find out whether you
really did roll up the whole of the ravelled worsted last night; and
_if_ you really persevered till it was finished, I have something to
give you from her, but not otherwise. How was it?" "Oh, it's finished,
Mamma; ask Nurse; for when I rolled it against her foot last night,
she took it for a great black dog." "Well then, I suppose this is
yours, Hermione; but, I must say, I never knew a gold thimble earned
so easily." Yes, dear little readers, it was a pretty gold thimble,
and round the bottom of it there was a rim of white enamel, and on the
enamel were gold letters.

"L'industrie ajoute à la beauté."

"Mamma," said Hermione, looking at it in delight, as she found it
exactly fitted her finger, "it's lovely; but, do you know, I think the
old lady ought to have given it to her granddaughter, Aurora, with
such a motto." "My dear, she has had it, she told me, some months in
her pocket secretly, for the purpose you mention, but she cannot ever
satisfy herself that Aurora has got the spirit of real industry in
her, and to bribe her to _earn_ the thimble is not her object, so you
see it has accidentally fallen to your share."