"But go on; what else?"
"And then I often wish I was a boy. It must be so much nicer to be a
boy. They're stronger than girls, and they know more. Don't you wish
I was a boy, mother?"
"Yes, I do, I often do!" exclaimed Lotty. "Boys aren't such a
trouble, and they can go out and shift for themselves."
"Oh, but I won't be a trouble to you," exclaimed Ida. "When I'm old
enough to leave school--"
She interrupted herself, for the moment she had actually forgotten
the misfortune which had come upon her. But her mother did not
observe the falling of her countenance, nor yet the incomplete
sentence.
"Ida, have I been a bad mother to you?" Lotty sobbed out presently.
"If I was to die, would you be sorry?"
"Mother!"
"I've done my best, indeed I've done my best for yon! How many
mothers like me would have brought you up as I've done? How many,
I'd like to know? And some day you'll hate me; oh yes, you will!
Some day you'll wish to forget all about me, and you'll never come
to see where I'm buried, and you'll get rid of everything that could
remind you of me. How I wish I'd never been born!"
Ida had often to comfort her mother in the latter's fits of low
spirits, but had never heard such sad words as these before.
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