Mistress Mary Quite Contrary.
Perhaps,” she said, “to be able to learn things quickly isn’t everything. To be kind is worth a great deal to other people. If Miss Minchin knew everything on earth and was like what she is now, she’d still be a detestable thing, and everybody would hate her. Lots of clever people have done harm and have been wicked. Look at Robespierre –.
People who are fond of books know the feeling of irritation which sweeps over them at such a moment. The temptation to be unreasonable and snappish is one not easy to manage.
Yes, miss, you are,” she cried, and her words were all broken. “Whats’ever ‘appens to you – whats’ever – you’d be a princess all the same – an’ nothin’ couldn’t make you nothin’ different.
When I lie by myself and remember I begin to have pains everywhere and I think of things that make me begin to scream because I hate them so.
I know I am queer,” admitted Sara, cheerfully; “and I TRY to be nice.
You can’t help being a doll,” she said with a resigned sigh, “any more than Lavinia and Jessie can help not having any sense. We are not all made alike. Perhaps you do your sawdust best.” And she kissed her and shook her clothes straight, and put her back upon her chair.
That’s almost like telling lies,” she said. “And lies – well, you see, they are not only wicked – they’re VULGAR. Sometimes” – reflectively – “I’ve thought perhaps I might do something wicked – I might suddenly fly into a rage and kill Miss Minchin, you know, when she was ill-treating me – but I COULDN’T be vulgar.
Somehow the sight of the dear little sixpence was good for both of them. It made them laugh a little, though they both had tears in their eyes.
And kissed her trembling honest mouth almost as if he had been a man – not quite – but almost.
The Bastille had melted away, the prisoners no longer existed.
Comme elle est drole!
And, somehow, Sara felt as if she understood her, though she said so little, and only stood still and looked and looked after her as she went out of the shop with the Indian gentleman, and they got into the carriage and drove away.
The obsession which is called Love is an emotion past all explanation. The persons susceptible to its power are as things beneath a spell. They see, hear, and feel that of which the rest of their world is unaware, and will remain unaware for ever.
I shall live forever and ever and ever!” he cried grandly. “I shall find out thousands and thousands of things. I shall find out about people and creatures and everything that grows – like Dickon – and I shall never stop making Magic. I’m well! I’m well! I feel – I feel as if I want to shout out something – something thankful, joyful!
She was not an affectionate child and had never cared much for any one.
Ben Weatherstaff.
You see, if people knew that dolls could do things, they would make them work. So, perhaps, they have promised each other to keep it a secret.
Everything’s a story. You are a story – I am a story. Miss Minchin is a story.
She went from place to place, and dug and weeded, and enjoyed herself so immensely that she was led on from bed to bed and into the grass under the trees. The exercise made her so warm that she first threw her coat off, and then her hat, and without knowing it she was smiling down on to the grass and the pale green points all the time.
If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it.”- Page. 164.