sked me what
was wrong between me and R. He had said of me: Any one can have the
_black goose for me_. Then he said that any one could take me in. I was
so stupid that I would believe anything. I can't think what he meant,
for he never took me in about anything. Anyhow I would not let _him_
spoil new year's day for me. But Hella is quite right for if the
first person one meets on January 1st is a common person that's a bad
beginning. The first thing this morning when I went out I met our old
postman who's always so grumpy if he's kept waiting at the door.
I looked the other way directly and across the street a fine young
gentleman was passing, but it was no good for the common postman had
really been the first.

January 12th. I am so angry. _We_ mayn't go skating any more because
Inspee has begun to complain again of her silly old ears and Mother
imagines that she got her earache last year skating. It's all right to
keep _her_ at home; but why shouldn't _I_ go? How can _I_ help it when
_she_ gets a chill so easily? In most things Father is justice itself,
but I really can't understand him this time. It's simply absurd, only
it's too miserable to call it absurd. I'm in a perfect fury. Still, I
don't say anything.

February 12th. I have not written for a whole month, I've been working
so hard. To-day we got our reports. Although I've been working so
frightfully hard, again I only got a 2 in Diligence. Frau Doktor M. made
a splendid speech and said: As you sow, so you shall reap. But that's
not always true. In Natural History I did not know my lesson twice but
I got a 1, and in History I only did not know my lesson once and I got
Satisfactory. Anyhow Fraulein V. does not like me because of that time
when I did not bow to her in the tram. That is why in January, when
Mother asked about me, she said: "She does not really put her back
into her work." I overheard Father say: After all she's only a kid, but
to-day he made a frightful row about the 2 in Diligence. He might have
known why she gave me that. Dora, _so she says_, has only ones, but
she has not shown me the report. I don't believe what I don't see. And
Mother never gives her away to me.

February 15th. Father is furious because Oswald has an Unsatisfactory in
Greek. Greek is really no use; for no one uses Greek, except the people
who live in Greece and Oswald will never go there, if he is going to be
a judge like Father. _Of course_ Dora learns Latin; but not for