Madam How was not sorry, though she had taken a great deal more trouble
with that stick than ever you had taken. She had been three years making
that stick, out of many things, sunbeams among the rest. But when it
fell into the river, Madam How knew that she should not lose her sunbeams
nor anything else: the stick would float down the river, and on into the
sea; and there, when it got heavy with the salt water, it would sink, and
lodge, and be buried, and perhaps ages hence turn into coal; and ages
after that some one would dig it up and burn it, and then out would come,
as bright warm flame, all the sunbeams that were stored away in that
stick: and so Madam How would have her own again. And if that should not
be the fate of your stick, still something else will happen to it just as
useful in the long run; for Madam How never loses anything, but uses up
all her scraps and odds and ends somehow, somewhere, somewhen, as is fit
and proper for the Housekeeper of the whole Universe. Indeed, Madam How
is so patient that some people fancy her stupid, and think that, because
she does not fall into a passion every time you steal her sweets, or
break her crockery, or disarrange her furniture, therefore she does not
care. But I advise you as a little boy, and still more when you grow up
to be a man, not to get that fancy into your head; for you will find
that, however good-natured and patient Madam How is in most matters, her
keeping silence and not seeming to see you is no sign that she has
forgotten. On the contrary, she bears a grudge (if one may so say, with
all respect to her) longer than any one else does; because she will
always have her own again. Indeed, I sometimes think that if it were not
for Lady Why, her mistress, she might bear some of her grudges for ever
and ever. I have seen men ere now damage some of Madam How's property
when they were little boys, and be punished by her all their lives long,
even though she had mended the broken pieces, or turned them to some
other use. Therefore I say to you, beware of Madam How. She will teach
you more kindly, patiently, and tenderly than any mother, if you want to