When her aunt left the room, she said, sorrowfully enough, "Don't you love me any more, Margaret?" "Of course I do!" said I, sitting down by her. "Why should you ask me such a question?" "Aunt Jemima says you don't," replied the child. "She says I am so selfish." "Selfish about what?" I asked. "She said it was selfish in me to let you work so hard at the doll just to please me, when there are so many poor people that need clothes, and that—that—" "Nonsense!" said I. I could not help it, so vexed was I at Lady Jemima. "I was very glad to make the doll, and shall be always glad to do anything for you." She brightened a little on this, but I could see all the afternoon that she was cast down, and I was sorry enough that I had left her to her aunt, who, good as she is, never seems to come near Betty without hurting her in some way. After all, my work here is to take care of Betty, and I don't believe God means I should let her suffer for the sake of saying my prayers, more than anything else. _April 18._ I have had a sharp dispute with Mr. Penrose. I had been walking as far as the Abbey ruin in the park, when he joined me: and after some discourse, began to ask me what I was reading. I told him that I was reading the Bishop's "Contemplations;" whereat, he spoke slightingly of the book, and said he would give me something better. Now, when I have learned to love a book as I have this one, 'tis all the same to me as a friend, and I cannot bear to hear it spoken against. So I answered something quickly that I wanted nothing better, and beside that, I had promised to read it. "But, Mistress Merton," said Mr. Penrose, "are you sure that you are the best judge? Am not I, your pastor, best fitted to direct your reading? And if I tell you that any book is unfit for you, are you to sit in judgment on what I say?" "Why not?" I answered, hotly enough. "Since you yourself, as it seems, presume to sit in judgment on your Bishop?" He was silent a moment, and did seem somewhat taken aback. Then he said, "You are something sharp. What is the Bishop to you, that you defend him so earnestly?" "He has been a good friend to me and mine," I answered; "and he is a good man, and a good preacher. He preached the best sermon in our parish church that ever I heard in all my life." I saw he was touched at this, and I was wicked enough to be glad I had given him a pinch, though no such thing was in my thought when I spoke. "Then," said he, "I am to conclude that my preaching does not please you?" "I don't sit in judgment on it," I said, demurely. Then willing to turn the conversation, I said, looking up to the great window which is still almost entire: "What a splendid pile this must have been in its day!" "Ah, yes!" he answered. "There was piety and zeal in England in those days." "And is there none now?" I asked.