The titles being all decided upon, Dumps and Chris went back to their
dolls, and Diddie began to write her first story.

"NETTIE HERBERT."

"Nettie Herbert was a poor little girl;" and then she stopped and
asked,

"Dumps, would you have Nettie Herbert a po' little girl?"

"No, I wouldn't have nobody er po' little girl," said Dumps,
conclusively, and Diddie drew a line through what she had written, and
began again.

"Nettie Herbert was a rich little girl, and she lived with her pa and
ma in a big house in Nu Orlins; and one time her father give her a
gold dollar, and she went down town, and bort a grate big wax doll
with open and shet eyes, and a little cooking stove with pots and
kittles, and a wuck box, and lots uv peices uv clorf to make doll
cloes, and a bu-te-ful gold ring, and a lockit with her pas hare in
it, and a big box full uv all kinds uv candy and nuts and razens and
ornges and things, and a little git-ar to play chunes on, and two
little tubs and some little iuns to wash her doll cloes with; then she
bort a little wheelbarrer, and put all the things in it, and started
fur home. When she was going a long, presently she herd sumbody cryin
and jes a sobbin himself most to deaf; and twas a poor little boy all
barefooted and jes as hungry as he could be; and he said his ma was
sick, and his pa was dead, and he had nine little sisters and seven
little bruthers, and he hadnt had a mouthful to eat in two weeks, and