"I'm not goin' to have her down there with her clothes
on any which way, an' everybody making remarks. Take your sacque off,
Lucretia."

"Oh, I got the bow on straight; it's real straight, it is, _honest_,"
pleaded young Lucretia, piteously. She clutched the plaid shawl tightly
together, but it was of no use--off the things had to come. And young
Lucretia had put on the prim whaleboned basque of her best dress wrong
side before; she had buttoned it in the back. There she stood, very much
askew and uncomfortable about the shoulder seams and sleeves, and hung
her head before her aunts.

"Lucretia Raymond, what _do_ you mean, putting your dress on this way?"

"All--the other--girls--wear--theirs buttoned in--the back."

"All the other girls! Well, you're not going to have yours buttoned in
the back, and wear holes through that nice ladies' cloth coat every time
you lean back against a chair. I should think you were crazy. I've a
good mind not to let you go out at all. Stand round here!"

Young Lucretia's basque was sharply unbuttoned, she was jerked out of
it, and it was turned around and fastened as it was meant to be. When
she was finally started, with her aunts' parting admonition echoing
after her, she felt sad and doubtful, but soon her merry disposition
asserted itself.

There was no jollier and more radiant little soul than she all through
the opening exercises. She listened to the speaking and the singing with
the greatest appreciation and delight. She sat up perfectly straight in
her prim and stiff basque; she folded her small red hands before her;
her two tight braids inclined stiffly towards her ears, and her face was
all aglow with smiles.

When the distribution of presents began her name was among the first
called. She arose with alacrity, and went with a gay little prance down
the aisle. She took the parcel that the teacher handed to her; she
commenced her journey back, when she suddenly encountered the eyes of
her aunt Lucretia and her aunt Maria. Then her terror and remorse began.
She had never dreamed of such a thing as her aunts coming--indeed, they
had not themselves. A neighbor had come in and persuaded them, and they
had taken a sudden start against their resolutions and their principles.

Young Lucretia's name was called again and again. Every time she slunk
more reluctantly and fearfully down to the tree; she knew that her
aunts' eyes were surveying her with more and more amazement.

After