“I named one--a novel I had not finished--and resigned myself to martyrdom. She reads fluently--her father says prettily; but the piping voice rasped my auriculars to the quick, and I soon stopped the exhibition. Then we essayed conversation, but our range of themes was limited, and a dismal silence succeeded to a short dialogue. By and by I told her that I was sleepy, hoping she would take the hint and leave my room. “'Then, mamma, I will just get my work-basket, and sit here, as still as a mouse, and prevent all disturbance.' “With that, she gets out her miniature thimble and scissors, and falls to work upon a pair of slippers she was embroidering for her father's birthday present, sitting up, starched and prim as an old maid, her lips pursed, and her forehead gravely consequential. I could not close my eyes without seeing her still, like an undersized nightmare, her hair smooth to the least hair, her dress neat to the smallest fold, stitching, stitching, the affected, conceited marmoset! “At last I said: “'Put down your sewing, Florence, and look out of the window at the people going by. You must be very tired.' “'Not in the least, mamma, dear,' answered Miss Pert. 'I like to work, and there is nothing interesting going on outside.' “I tossed and sighed, and she was by me in a second. “'Darling mamma! my poor, sweet little mother!' in her reed-like chirp; 'can I do nothing to make you feel better?' putting her hands upon my head and stroking my face until my flesh crawled. “'Yes,' said I, out of all patience. 'Take yourself off, and don't let me see you again until to-morrow morning! You kill me with your teasing.' “And would you believe it? she just put up her sewing in the basket and went directly out, without a tear or a murmur, and when her father came home he could not prevail upon her, by commands or persuasions, to accompany him further than the door of my chamber. So he, who won't admit that she can do anything wrong, instead of whipping her for her obstinacy, as he ought to have done, guessed she 'had some reason' for her disobedience which she did not like to tell, and interrogated poor, persecuted me. When he had heard my version of the manner in which we had spent the afternoon, he only said, 'I should have foreseen this. But the child--she is only a child, Rosa!--did her best!' and he looked so mournful that I, knowing he blamed me for his bantling's freak of temper, told him plainly that he cared a thousand times more for this diminutive bundle of hypocrisy than he ever did for me, and that his absurd favoritism was fast begetting in me a positive dislike for her. I couldn't endure the sight of the sulky little mischief-maker for a week after her complaint of barbarity had brought the look into his face I knew so well.” “O Rosa, she is your own flesh and blood! and, as her father said, a mere baby yet! You said, too, that she refused to assign any cause to him for her singular conduct.”