Felicity--who really was in an unbearable mood that night--laughed disagreeably; but Cecily gave her a fierce nudge, which probably restrained her from speaking.
"I will not eat any apples," wrote Felix.
"What on earth do you want to give up eating apples for?" asked Peter in astonishment.
"Never mind," returned Felix.
"Apples make people fat, you know," said Felicity sweetly.
"It seems a funny kind of resolution," I said doubtfully. "I think our resolutions ought to be giving up wrong things or doing right ones."
"You make your resolutions to suit yourself and I'll make mine to suit myself," said Felix defiantly.
"I shall never get drunk," wrote Peter painstakingly.
"But you never do," said the Story Girl in astonishment.
"Well, it will be all the easier to keep the resolution," argued Peter.
"That isn't fair," complained Dan. "If we all resolved not to do the things we never do we'd all be on the Roll of Honour."
"You let Peter alone," said Felicity severely. "It's a very good resolution and one everybody ought to make."
"I shall not be jealous," wrote the Story Girl.
"But are you?" I asked, surprised.
The Story Girl coloured and nodded. "Of one thing," she confessed, "but I'm not going to tell what it is."
"I'm jealous sometimes, too," confessed Sara Ray, "and so my first resolution will be 'I shall try not to feel jealous when I hear the other girls in school describing all the sick spells they've had.'"
"Goodness, do you want to be sick?" demanded Felix in astonishment.
"It makes a person important," explained Sara Ray.
"I am going to try to improve my mind by reading good books and listening to older people," wrote Cecily.
"You got that out of the Sunday School paper," cried Felicity.
"It doesn't matter where I got it," said Cecily with dignity.
"The main thing is to keep it."
"It's your turn, Felicity," I said.
Felicity tossed her beautiful golden head.
"I told you I wasn't going to make any resolutions. Go on yourself."
"I shall always study my grammar lesson," I wrote--I, who loathed grammar with a deadly loathing.
"I hate grammar too," sighed Sara Ray. "It seems so unimportant."
Sara was rather fond of a big word, but did not always get hold of the right one. I rather suspected that in the above instance she really meant uninteresting.
"I won't get mad at Felicity, if I can help it," wrote Dan.
"I'm sure I never do anything to make you mad," exclaimed Felicity.
"I don't think it's polite to make resolutions about your sisters," said Peter.
"He can't keep it anyway," scoffed Felicity. "He's got such an awful temper."
"It's a family failing," flashed Dan, breaking his resolution ere the ink on it was dry.
"There you go," taunted Felicity.
"I'll work all my arithmetic problems without any help," scribbled Felix.
"I wish I could resolve that, too," sighed Sara Ray, "but it wouldn't be any use. I'd never be able to do those compound multiplication sums the teacher gives us to do at home every night if I didn't get Judy Pineau to help me. Judy isn't a good reader and she can't spell AT ALL, but you can't stick her in arithmetic as far as she went herself. I feel sure," concluded poor Sara, in a hopeless tone, "that I'll NEVER be able to understand compound multiplication."
"'Multiplication is vexation, Division is as bad, The rule of three perplexes me, And fractions drive me mad,'" quoted Dan.
"I haven't got as far as fractions yet," sighed Sara, "and I hope I'll be too big to go to school before I do. I hate arithmetic, but I am PASSIONATELY fond of geography."
"I will not play tit-tat-x on the fly leaves of my hymn book in church," wrote Peter.
"Mercy, did you ever do such a thing?" exclaimed Felicity in horror.
Peter nodded shamefacedly.
"Yes--that Sunday Mr. Bailey preached. He was so long-winded, I got awful tired, and, anyway, he was talking about things I couldn't understand, so I played tit-tat-x with one of the Markdale boys. It was the day I was sitting up in the gallery."
"Well, I hope if you ever do the like again you won't do it in OUR pew," said Felicity severely.
"I ain't going to do it at all," said Peter. "I felt sort of mean all the rest of the day."
"I shall try not to be vexed when people interrupt me when I'm telling stories," wrote the Story Girl. "but it will be hard," she added with a sigh.
"I never mind being interrupted," said Felicity.
"I shall try to be cheerful and smiling all the time," wrote Cecily.
"You are, anyway," said Sara Ray loyally.
"I don't believe we ought to be cheerful ALL the time," said the Story Girl. "The Bible says we ought to weep with those who weep."
"But maybe it means that we're to weep cheerfully," suggested Cecily.
"Sorter as if you were thinking, 'I'm very sorry for you but I'm mighty glad I'm not in the scrape too,'" said Dan.
"Dan, don't be irreverent," rebuked Felicity.
"I know a story about old Mr. and Mrs. Davidson of Markdale," said the Story Girl. "She was always smiling and it used to aggravate her husband, so one day he said very crossly, 'Old lady, what ARE you grinning at?' 'Oh, well, Abiram, everything's so bright and pleasant, I've just got to smile.'
"Not long after there came a time when everything went wrong--the crop failed and their best cow died, and Mrs. Davidson had rheumatism; and finally Mr. Davidson fell and broke his leg. But still Mrs. Davidson smiled. 'What in the dickens are you grinning about now, old lady?' he demanded. 'Oh, well, Abiram,' she said, 'everything is so dark and unpleasant I've just got to smile.'
'Well,' said the old man crossly, 'I think you might give your face a rest sometimes.'"
"I shall not talk gossip," wrote Sara Ray with a satisfied air.
