nd mess. Anne, now, drives me nearly wild with her
rushy, helter-skelter ways. You wouldn't think it, would you,
considering that she's fourteen, and the eldest, and that she's been the
eldest all her life?--eldests _should_ be steady and good examples. And
her name sounds steady and neat, doesn't it? and yet of all the untidy,
unpunctual--no, I mustn't let myself go like that. Besides, it's quite
true, as Hebe says, Anne has got a very good heart, and she's very
particular in some _mind_ ways; she never says a word that isn't quite
true--she doesn't even exaggerate. I have noticed that rather tiresome,
careless people often have very good hearts. I wish they could see how
much nicer it would be for other people if they'd put some of their good
hearts into their tiresome ways.

On the whole, it's Hebe that suits the best with me. She
particular--_much_ more particular than Anne, though not quite as
particular as _I'd_ like her to be, and then she is really awfully
sweet. That makes her a little worrying sometimes, for she will take
sides. If I am in a great state at finding our postage stamps all
muddled, for instance--Anne and Hebe and I have a collection together, I
am sorry to say--and _I_ know who's been at them and say something--who
could help saying something if they found a lot of carefully-sorted ones
ready to gum in, all pitched into the unsorted box with Uncle Brian's
last envelopeful that I haven't looked over?--up flies Hebe in Anne's
defence.

'Poor Anne, she was in such a hurry, she never meant it'; or 'she only
wanted to help you, Jack; she didn't know you had sorted these.'

Now, isn't that rather trying? For it makes me feel as if I was horrid;
and if Hebe would just say, 'Yes, it _is_ awfully tiresome,' I'd feel I
had a sort of right to be vexed, and when you feel that, the vexedness
often goes away.

Still, there's no doubt Hebe _is_ sweet, and I daresay she flies up for
me just as she does for the others when I am the one not there.

We're all very fond of Hebe. She and Serena are rather like each other;
they have fair fluffy hair and rosy cheeks, but they're not a bit like
each other in themselves. Serena is a terrible tomboy--worse than Anne,
for she really never thinks at all. Anne does mean to think, but she
does it the wrong way; she gets her head so full of some one thing that
she forgets everything else, and then she's awfully sorry. But Serry
just doesn't think at all, though she's very