her father opened a package
which he had brought on his return, he silently placed in her hands a
beautiful copy of a newly-published work, upon the fly-leaf of which she
found written--"Maria Wilton--a reward for her kind and obliging manners
towards her brothers and sisters."

SMALL CRAFT

When they had finished the story, Lucy shut the book, saying, "Maria was
a good girl, was not she, Rollo?"

"Yes," said Rollo, "she was an excellent girl. I would have done just
so; would not you, Lucy?"

"I ought to, I know," said Lucy, "but perhaps I should not."

"I should, I am sure," said Rollo.

Lucy was a polite girl, and she did not contradict Rollo, though she
recollected how much selfishness he had shown that morning, and it did
not seem to her very likely that he would have been willing to make any
very great sacrifice to oblige others.

"My father says we cannot tell what we should do until we are tried,"
said Lucy.

"Well, I _know_ I should have been willing to stay at home, if I had
been Maria," replied Rollo.

"But, only think, that would be preferring another person's pleasure
rather than your own."

"Well, I _should_ prefer another person's pleasure rather than my own."

Rollo was beginning to get a little excited and vexed. People who boast
of excellences which they do not possess, are very apt to be
unreasonable and angry when any body seems to doubt whether their
boastings are true. He was thus going on, insisting upon it that he
should have acted as Maria had done, and was just saying that he should
prefer another person's pleasure rather than his own, when Jonas came
into the entry from the kitchen, with an armful of wood, which he was
carrying into the parlor.

"When is it, Rollo," said Jonas, "that you prefer another person's
pleasure to your own?"

"Always," said Rollo, with an air of self-conceit and consequence.

Jonas smiled, and went on with his wood.

It is always better for boys to be modest and humble-minded. They appear
ridiculous to others when they are boasting what _great_ things they can
do; and when they boast what _good_ things they do they are very likely
to be just on the eve of doing exactly the opposite.

In a moment Jonas came back out of the parlor, and said, as he passed
through,

"Self-praise
Goes but little ways;"

a short piece of versification which all boys and girls would do well to
remember.

Now it happened that, all this time, Rollo's mother wa