"Well, Martha Jane, I don't hold much with wasting time over tales and novels myself. You read a deal too many, and where's the good?" "I should waste my time more than I do but for some talcs I've read," said Martha, colouring. "Well, `Waste not, want not.' Read your Bible, I say." "That's not in the Bible, Aunt Lizzie." "It might be," said Mrs Stroud; "there's a deal of truth in it. But, bless you, Martha, it ain't talcs nor nonsense of that kind that signifies. Florrie must be held in. She's that saucy, and that bouncing and set on her own way, that there's only one in the family she's like, Martha Jane, and that's 'Enery himself." "Harry! Oh, Aunt Lizzie! But she's a girl." "Well, Martha Jane, and if she is? There's plenty of ways for girls to trouble their families. You wasn't more than eleven or so when 'Enery went; but surely you can recollect him, ramping round. Why, when he come to sit with his family he was like an engine with the steam up for starting off again! And he went about that audacious!" "I can remember his jumping me off the tomb-stones," said Martha. "Ah! He jumped off tomb-stones once too often. It all came of ramping about and reading, so there's lessons in it for you and Florence both. Well, I promised a call on Mrs Taylor at the upper lodge, so I'll stroll up quietly and meet your father, and come back for a cup of tea." Martha made no objection to this proposal; for though she never "answered back," nor asserted herself against her elders, she strongly resented the connection between ramping about and reading, and between herself and the troublesome Florence, and was very glad to get rid of her aunt for the present. She sat still when Mrs Stroud, having assumed her mantle and opened her parasol, walked up the cemetery to meet her brother. She really wished to be a good elder sister; but what could she do with a girl only three years younger than herself, and with more "go" in her little finger than poor Martha had in her whole body?