g, and He wasn't listening at all!"

At last I got her quieted, and explained, by means of a rupee and an
anna, how sometimes God gives us something better than we ask for; we
ask for an anna, and He gives us a rupee. A rupee holds sixteen annas.
She grew interested: "Then my passing that examination was the anna. But
what is the rupee?" Now the Elf, as you may have observed, is not
weighted with over much humility, so I told her I thought the rupee must
be humility. She considered a while, then sliding off my knee, she knelt
down and said, with the utmost gravity and purpose, "O God! I did not
want that kind of answer, but I do want it now. Give me the rupee of
humility!" Then springing up with eyes dancing with mischief, "Next time
I fall into pride you will say, 'Oh, where is that rupee?'"

When the school examinations were over, and the Missie Ammal came back
to rest, I asked her about the Elf. "She really did very badly, seemed
to know nothing of her subjects; should not have gone in, poor mite!" It
suddenly struck me to ask what class she had gone into. "The first,"
said the Missie Ammal. "But she is in the infants'!" Then we understood.
The Elf had only been at school for a few months, and had just finished
the infant standard book, and had been moved into the first a day or two
before, as the teacher felt she was well able to clear the first course
in the next six months and take her examination in the following year,
two years' work in one. But it was not intended she should go in for
the Government examination, which requires a certain time to be spent in
preparation; so when, in the confusion of the arrangement of the
classes, she stood with her little class-fellows of two days only, the
mistake was not noticed. No wonder the poor Elf failed! We never told
her the reason, not desiring to raise fresh questions upon the
mysterious ways of Providence in her busy little brain; and to this day,
when she is betrayed into pride, she shakes her head solemnly at
herself, and remembers the rupee.

She has lately been staying with the Missie Ammals, "my very particular
friends," as she calls them, at the C.E.Z. House, in Palamcottah. She
returned to us full of matter, and charged with a new idea. "I am no
more going to spend my pocket money upon vanities. I am going to save it
all up, and buy a _Gee-lit Bible_." This gilt-edged treasure is a
fruitful source of conversation. It will take about six years at the
rate of