e pick them, but we feel compelled
to do so; and we smell and smell till the delight becomes almost pain.
Afterward we pull the green leaves softly into pieces to see the silk
threads run across.

Beyond the kopje grow some pale-green, hairy-leaved bushes. We are so
small, they meet over our head, and we sit among them, and kiss them,
and they love us back; it seems as though they were alive.

One day we sit there and look up at the blue sky, and down at our fat
little knees; and suddenly it strikes us, Who are we? This I, what
is it? We try to look in upon ourselves, and ourself beats back upon
ourself. Then we get up in great fear and run home as hard as we can. We
can't tell any one what frightened us. We never quite lose that feeling
of self again.

III.

And then a new time rises. We are seven years old. We can read now--read
the Bible. Best of all we like the story of Elijah in his cave at Horeb,
and the still small voice.

One day, a notable one, we read on the kopje, and discover the fifth
chapter of Matthew, and read it all through. It is a new gold-mine. Then
we tuck the Bible under our arm and rushed home. They didn't know it was
wicked to take your things again if some one took them, wicked to go to
law, wicked to--! We are quite breathless when we get to the house; we
tell them we have discovered a chapter they never heard of; we tell them
what it says. The old wise people tell us they knew all about it. Our
discovery is a mare's-nest to them; but to us it is very real. The ten
commandments and the old "Thou shalt" we have heard about long enough
and don't care about it; but this new law sets us on fire.

We will deny ourself. Our little wagon that we have made, we give to the
little Kaffers. We keep quiet when they throw sand at us (feeling, oh,
so happy). We conscientiously put the cracked teacup for ourselves at
breakfast, and take the burnt roaster-cake. We save our money, and buy
threepence of tobacco for the Hottentot maid who calls us names. We
are exotically virtuous. At night we are profoundly religious; even
the ticking watch says, "Eternity, eternity! hell, hell, hell!" and the
silence talks of God, and the things that shall be.

Occasionally, also, unpleasantly shrewd questions begin to be asked by
some one, we know not who, who sits somewhere behind our shoulder. We
get to know him better afterward.

Now we carry the questions to the grown-up people, and they give us
answers. We are m