pleased I was in listening to you! So I will cut it smooth.
There, see how well I have ordered it! These scraps, together with the
currants, will be more than I shall want for breakfast; and the first
poor man that I meet going home shall have the rest, even though he
should not play upon the violin.

Amendment

Charles Grant lived in a good house, and wore fine clothes, and had a
great many pretty toys to play with; yet Charles was seldom happy or
pleased; for he was never good. He did not mind what his mother said to
him, and would not learn to read, though he was now seven years old.

He called the servants names, pinched and beat his little sister Clara,
and took away her playthings, and was not kind and good to her, as a
brother should be. 'Oh, what a sad boy Charles is!' was his mother's
daily bitter exclamation.

His father was a proud, bad man, who let Charles have his own way,
because he was his only son, and he thought him handsome. But how could
anyone be handsome that was so naughty? I am sure that when he was
froward, and put out his lip, and frowned, he looked quite ugly. Mother
told him so, and said that no one was pretty that was not good; but
Charles did not mind his mother, and was so vain he would stand before
the looking-glass half the day, instead of learning his lessons; and was
so silly he would say, 'What a pretty little boy I am! I am glad I am
not a shabby boy, like Giles Bloomfield, our cowboy.' At such times his
mother would say to him: 'I wish, Charles, you were only half as good as
Giles; he is not much older than you, yet he can read in the Bible quite
well; he works hard for his poor mother, and never vexes her, as you do
me; and when he comes home of an evening, he nurses the baby, and is
kind to all his sisters. I dare say he never pinched nor beat any of
them in his life.'

'Oh!' said that wicked Charles, 'I hate him for all that, for he wears
ragged clothes, and has no toys to play with.'

'Oh fie, Charles!' said his mother; 'you are a wicked boy: have not I
often told you that God made the poor as well as the rich, and He will
hate those who despise them? Now, Charles, if God, to punish you for
your pride, were to take away your father and me, and you had no money
to buy food, and your clothes became old and ragged, you would then be a
poor, shabby boy, and worse off than Giles; for you could not earn your
own living, as he does; and you would consequently be starved to