ll warrant that's what ails you."

"No, it don't ail me now. I spitted it out."

After nibbling a few crackers, and the inside of the cake, the happy
family moved away from the table, hungrier than when they had sat down.

"What is home without a mother?" sang Horace, in a plaintive voice; and
Dotty joined in, with emphasis.

Prudy looked as low-spirited as the "black-valley cake."

"I hope Uncle Augustus will be able to come home to-morrow. I declare,
we are real cruel not to feel worse about his being sick away off there
in a hotel."

"You'd better believe he gets things to eat," responded Lady Magnifico,
aside to the doctor. "I'd rather be some sick than have a landlady
that's purblind and _purdeaf_, and such _owdrageous_ poor cooking! Glad
I'm going out to Christmas dinner."

CHAPTER VI.

PRUDY IN A NEW LIGHT.

Mother Hubbard was heated, and tired, and hungry, and cross. It was all
very well for a lady boarder to loll on an ottoman, play with her rings,
and find fault. It was all very well for a gentleman boarder to fire
poor jokes; but they couldn't either of them know how every word cut
like a lash. When the doctor said, carelessly, "Some people think
themselves great cooks, my lady; but the proof of the pudding's in the
eating," why, that speech was "the pin in the end of the lash."

Prudy saw now that she had pretended to know a great deal more than she
really did. Pretension is very apt to get laughed at. She had always
scorned Dotty's self-conceit; but hadn't she shown quite as much
herself? Making her auntie suppose she understood cooking, and putting
Mrs. Fixfax to all this trouble for nothing? How horrified auntie would
be, and the housekeeper too, if they should dream that this little
family was starving, with a cook-book lying open on the floor!

"But I declare, it's real mean in you two to make fun of me," cried the
young landlady, tipping the sugar-basin plump into the dish-tub; "you
couldn't get any better supper yourselves, nor half so good; so there!"

Surprised at the sharp sound of her own voice, dismayed at sight of the
wet sugar, and completely discouraged by the aspect of things in
general, Prudy burst out into a sort of frenzy. She was ashamed of
herself, but she couldn't stop.

"You think I can bear everything--you and Dotty both! People are careful
what they say to Dotty, for her temper's just like live coals; but they
talk to me, and say anything; anything they've a mi