"Oh, don't you think that's a little TOO strict?" asked Cecily anxiously. "Of course, it's not right to talk MEAN gossip, but the harmless kind doesn't hurt. If I say to you that Emmy MacPhail is going to get a new fur collar this winter, THAT is harmless gossip, but if I say I don't see how Emmy MacPhail can afford a new fur collar when her father can't pay my father for the oats he got from him, that would be MEAN gossip. If I were you, Sara, I'd put MEAN gossip."
Sara consented to this amendment.
"I will be polite to everybody," was my third resolution, which passed without comment.
"I'll try not to use slang since Cecily doesn't like it," wrote Dan.
"I think some slang is real cute," said Felicity.
"The Family Guide says it's very vulgar," grinned Dan. "Doesn't it, Sara Stanley?"
"Don't disturb me," said the Story Girl dreamily. "I'm just thinking a beautiful thought."
"I've thought of a resolution to make," cried Felicity. "Mr.
Marwood said last Sunday we should always try to think beautiful thoughts and then our lives would be very beautiful. So I shall resolve to think a beautiful thought every morning before breakfast."
"Can you only manage one a day?" queried Dan.
"And why before breakfast?" I asked.
"Because it's easier to think on an empty stomach," said Peter, in all good faith. But Felicity shot a furious glance at him.
"I selected that time," she explained with dignity, "because when I'm brushing my hair before my glass in the morning I'll see my resolution and remember it."
"Mr. Marwood meant that ALL our thoughts ought to be beautiful," said the Story Girl. "If they were, people wouldn't be afraid to say what they think."
"They oughtn't to be afraid to, anyhow," said Felix stoutly. "I'm going to make a resolution to say just what I think always."
"And do you expect to get through the year alive if you do?" asked Dan.
"It might be easy enough to say what you think if you could always be sure just what you DO think," said the Story Girl. "So often I can't be sure."
"How would you like it if people always said just what they think to you?" asked Felicity.
"I'm not very particular what SOME people think of me," rejoined Felix.
"I notice you don't like to be told by anybody that you're fat," retorted Felicity.
"Oh, dear me, I do wish you wouldn't all say such sarcastic things to each other," said poor Cecily plaintively. "It sounds so horrid the last night of the old year. Dear knows where we'll all be this night next year. Peter, it's your turn."
"I will try," wrote Peter, "to say my prayers every night regular, and not twice one night because I don't expect to have time the next,--like I did the night before the party," he added.
"I s'pose you never said your prayers until we got you to go to church," said Felicity--who had had no hand in inducing Peter to go to church, but had stoutly opposed it, as recorded in the first volume of our family history.
"I did, too," said Peter. "Aunt Jane taught me to say my prayers.
Ma hadn't time, being as father had run away; ma had to wash at night same as in day-time."
"I shall learn to cook," wrote the Story Girl, frowning.
"You'd better resolve not to make puddings of--" began Felicity, then stopped as suddenly as if she had bitten off the rest of her sentence and swallowed it. Cecily had nudged her, so she had probably remembered the Story Girl's threat that she would never tell another story if she was ever twitted with the pudding she had made from sawdust. But we all knew what Felicity had started to say and the Story Girl dealt her a most uncousinly glance.
"I will not cry because mother won't starch my aprons," wrote Sara Ray.
"Better resolve not to cry about anything," said Dan kindly.
Sara Ray shook her head forlornly.
"That would be too hard to keep. There are times when I HAVE to cry. It's a relief."
"Not to the folks who have to hear you," muttered Dan aside to Cecily.
"Oh, hush," whispered Cecily back. "Don't go and hurt her feelings the last night of the old year. Is it my turn again?
Well, I'll resolve not to worry because my hair is not curly.
But, oh, I'll never be able to help wishing it was."
"Why don't you curl it as you used to do, then?" asked Dan.
"You know very well that I've never put my hair up in curl papers since the time Peter was dying of the measles," said Cecily reproachfully. "I resolved then I wouldn't because I wasn't sure it was quite right."
"I will keep my finger-nails neat and clean," I wrote. "There, that's four resolutions. I'm not going to make any more. Four's enough."
"I shall always think twice before I speak," wrote Felix.
"That's an awful waste of time," commented Dan, "but I guess you'll need to if you're always going to say what you think."
"I'm going to stop with three," said Peter.
"I will have all the good times I can," wrote the Story Girl.
"THAT'S what I call sensible," said Dan.
"It's a very easy resolution to keep, anyhow," commented Felix.
"I shall try to like reading the Bible," wrote Sara Ray.
"You ought to like reading the Bible without trying to," exclaimed Felicity.
"If you had to read seven chapters of it every time you were naughty I don't believe you would like it either," retorted Sara Ray with a flash of spirit.
"I shall try to believe only half of what I hear," was Cecily's concluding resolution.
"But which half?" scoffed Dan.
"The best half," said sweet Cecily simply.
"I'll try to obey mother ALWAYS," wrote Sara Ray, with a tremendous sigh, as if she fully realized the difficulty of keeping such a resolution. "And that's all I'm going to make."
"Felicity has only made one," said the Story Girl.
"I think it better to make just one and keep it than make a lot and break them," said Felicity loftily.
She had the last word on the subject, for it was time for Sara Ray to go, and our circle broke up. Sara and Felix departed and we watched them down the lane in the moonlight--Sara walking demurely in one runner track, and Felix stalking grimly along in the other.
I fear the romantic beauty of that silver shining night was entirely thrown away on my mischievous brother.
