Maria looked at her, her mouth was quivering. "Did I look like Mrs.
Jasper Cone's baby that died last week when I was a baby?" said she.

"Who said you did?" inquired her mother, unguardedly.

"She did. She came up behind me with Mrs. Elliot when I was waiting
for father to get the peaches, and she said her baby that died looked
just like me; she had always thought so."

"That Cone baby look like you!" repeated Maria's mother. "Well, one's
own always looks different to them, I suppose."

"Then you don't think it did?" said Maria. Tears actually stood in
her beautiful blue eyes.

"No, I don't," replied her mother, abruptly. "Nobody in their sober
senses could think so. I am sorry poor Mrs. Cone lost her baby. I
know how I felt when my first baby died, but as for saying it looked
like you--"

"Then you don't think it did, mother?"

"It was one of the homliest babies I ever laid my eyes on, poor
little thing, if it did die," said Maria's mother, emphatically. She
was completely disarmed by this time. But when she saw Maria glance
again at the glass she laid hold of her moral weapons, the wielding
of which she believed to be for the best spiritual good of her child.
"Your aunt Maria was very much better looking than you at her age,"
she repeated, firmly. Then, at the sight of the renewed quiver around