children's parties I attended; my mother seemed to think, (with respect
to me, at least,) that as long as a dress was clean and in good repair,
there was no need of a change--she left nothing to the pleasure of
variety. There appeared to be an inexhaustible store of the same
material in a certain capacious drawer; did an elbow give out, a new
sleeve instantly supplied its place--did I happen to realize the ancient
saying: "There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip," and make my
lap the recipient of some of the goodies provided for us at our
entertainments, the soiled front breadth disappeared, and was replaced
by another, fresh and new--did the waist grow short, it was made over
again--there verily seemed to be no end to the dress; I came to the
conclusion that blue Circassian was the most ugly material ever
invented, and often found myself calculating how many yards there might
be left.

My school hats always looked the worse for wear, and my Sunday ones were
not much better; but once my mother took me to the city, and bought me,
for school, a far handsomer hat than I had hitherto worn for best, and a
still better one for great occasions. Here I, who scarcely ever looked
decent about the upper story, actually had two new hats at once! The
best one, I remember, was a round gipsy flat, then altogether the
fashion; and the first Sunday I put it on I made a perfect fool of
myself by twisting my hair in strings, intended to pass for natural
ringlets, and allowing said strings to hang all around beneath the brim
of my hat. Mamma was sick and confined to her room, and I managed to
appear at church with this ridiculous head-gear. People certainly stared
a little, but this my vanity easily converted into looks of admiration
directed towards my new hat, and perhaps also my improved beauty--and
came home more full of self-complacency than ever.