Page:Orange Grove.djvu/146

 reason with you. I always stood up for children because it is in their training this fretfulness begins. If parents were always pleasant to each other, as well as to every member of the family, their children would catch the same spirit, instead of growing up in this fretful way of speaking, a habit it is hard to get out of, when really no ill is meant by it."

"Ah, you hypocrite! What good is all your prayin' and preachin' goin' to do if a body ain't no better for it? Now you see it's this forcin' natur' out of her course in not lettin' the little ones enjoy themselves 'cause it's good for 'em to be crossed, that makes 'em so sour when they get well broke in."

"It will do very well for you to talk, Kate, who never had any experience. Perhaps if you had half a dozen children to take care of they would sometimes be crossed when they ought not to be, and you might lose your temper occasionally. That would not make it right, to be sure, but it shows how much easier it is to preach than to practice."

"Any body'd think you'd had as many children as the old woman that lived in a shoe to hear you talk, as if you knew all about 'em. I want talkin' about myself who don't pretend to be anything but an old sinner, I want you to tell me wherein good folks differ from bad ones."

"What a question! Your own observation ought to tell you that."

"So it does to my way of thinkin'. I've tried all the afternoon to get your notion about it, and ain't no wiser now than I was when I begun. I 'spose