t _ourselves_, it is always a bad plan, though I know it
can't quite be helped now and then.

Pet was the eldest, and a very useful "understanding" little eldest she
was. _She_ knew that her mother had troubles sometimes, and she did her
best to smooth them away whenever she possibly could.

One of the things she was often able to do to help her mother was by
keeping her little brothers and sisters happy and amused when they came
down to the drawing-room in the evening, and now and then, if it were a
rainy day, earlier. For mamma felt sorry for the children if they were
shut up in the nursery for long, and as all little people know, a
change to the drawing-room is very pleasant for them, though sometimes
rather tiring for mammas.

[Illustration]

It happened one afternoon, a very wet and cold afternoon in January,
when there was no possibility of going out, that _all_ the children were
downstairs together. There were four of them besides Pet, and it was not
very easy to amuse them all. But Pet was determined to do her very
best--for she knew that mamma was _particularly_ busy that day, as she
had all her accounts to do. And indeed poor mamma would have been very
glad to have a quiet afternoon, but nurse had a headache, and baby, who
had had a bad night, was sleeping peacefully for the first time, and
must not be disturbed. There was nothing for it but to bring the little
troop downstairs.

"We will be very good and quiet, mamma dear," said Pet. "You can go on
doing your accounts, for I know you can't do them this evening, as aunty
is coming. Charley and I,"--Charley was the next in age to Pet--"will
show all our best picture-books to the little ones."

Charley was very proud to hear himself counted a big one with Pet, and
he did all he could to help her. They really managed to keep the others
quiet, and Pet was hoping that mamma was getting on nicely with her long
rows of figures, and that soon she would be calling out gladly, "All
right. I can come and play with you now," when to her distress she heard
her mother give a deep sigh.

"Oh, dear mamma, what's the matter?" she said, "are we disturbing you?"

"No, darling, you are as quiet as mice," her mother replied. "But I
don't know how it is--I have counted it all up again and again, and I am
_sure_ I have put down everything I have spent, but I am half-a-crown
wrong. Dear, dear--what a pity it is! Just as I thought I had finished."

And again mamma sighed. Sh