A few weeks before her mother's death she had given to Ella her straw hat, which she had outgrown, and now the only bonnet she possessed was the veritable blue one of which George Moreland had made fun, and which by this time was nearly worn out.

Mrs.Campbell, who tried to do right and thought that she did, had noticed Mary's absence from church, and once on speaking of the subject before Hannah, the latter suggested that probably she had no bonnet, saying that the one which she wore at her mother's funeral was borrowed Mrs.Campbell immediately looked over her things, and selecting a straw which she herself had worn three years before, she tied a black ribbon across it, and sent it as a present to Mary.
The bonnet had been rather large for Mrs.Campbell, and was of course a world too big for Mary, whose face looked bit, as Sal expressed it, "like a yellow pippin stuck into the far end of a firkin." Miss Grundy, however, said "it was plenty good enough for a pauper," reminding Mary that "beggars shouldn't be choosers." "So it is good enough for paupers like you," returned Sal, "but people who understand grammar always have a keen sense of the ridiculous." Mary made no remark whatever, but she secretly wondered if Ella wore such a hat.

Still her desire to see her sister and to visit her mother's grave, prevailed over all other feelings, and on Sunday morning it was a very happy child which at about nine o'clock bounded down the stairway, tidily dressed in a ten cent black lawn and a pair of clean white pantalets.
There was another circumstance, too, aside from the prospect of seeing Ella, which made her eyes sparkle until they were almost black.

The night before, in looking over the articles of dress which she would need, she discovered that there was not a decent pair of stockings in her wardrobe.

Mrs.Grundy, to whom she mentioned the fact, replied with a violent shoulder jerk, "For the land's sake! ain't you big enough to go to meetin' barefoot, or did you think we kept silk stockin's for our quality to wear ?" Before the kitchen looking-glass, Sal was practising a courtesy which she intended making to any one who chanced to notice her next day; but after overhearing Miss Grundy's remark, she suddenly brought her exercises to a close and left the kitchen.