She soon discovered that most provisions could be bought a few cents
cheaper in the market than in the stores, so every Saturday afternoon
she made a trip downtown with a big market basket and bought the week's
supply of butter, eggs and vegetables. At first the necessity for
spending carfare cut into her profits, but she got around this in an
adroit way that promised well for her future ability to handle her
affairs to the best advantage. She tried a little publicity work to
swing things around to suit her purpose. She simply exalted the joys of
marketing until the other Winnebagos were crazy to do the family
marketing, too. As soon as Gladys caught the fever her object was
accomplished, for Gladys took all the girls to market in her father's
big car and brought all their purchases home. So Migwan accomplished her
own ends and gave the Winnebagos a new opportunity to pursue knowledge
at the same time.

At Christmas time she had also fallen back on her ingenuity to produce
the gifts she wished to give. There was no money at all to be spent for
this purpose. Migwan took a careful stock of the resources of the house.
The only promising thing she found was a leather skin which Hinpoha had
given her the summer before for helping her write up the weekly Count in
Hiawatha meter, which was outside of Hinpoha's range of talents. She
considered the possibilities of that skin carefully. It must yield seven
articles--a present for each of the Winnebagos. She decided on book
covers. She wrote up seven different incidents of the summer camping
trip in verse and copied them with the typewriter on rough yellow
drawing paper, thinking to decorate each sheet. But Migwan had little
artistic ability and soon saw that her decorations were not beautiful
enough to adorn Christmas gifts. After spoiling several pages she gave
up in disgust and threw the spoiled pages into the grate. The next
morning she was cleaning out the grate and found the pieces of paper,