Still the Same Age. But no Date.

I wish we could choose our own presents, don't you?

People give you surprises, or think they do. For mostly you can tell pretty well by keeping an eye on the parcels and things as they come in. Or one of the servants tells you, or you hear the Grown-ups whispering when they think you are not attending. Attending! Why, you are always attending. How could you learn else? They did just the same themselves, only they forget.

Of all presents, I hate most "useful" ones—"to teach you how to keep your things tidy," and what "you will be sure to need by and by, you know, dear!"

For when the time comes you've had it so long that you don't care a button about it. I suppose there are some Miss Polly Prinks who like things to put on. But I haven't got to that yet. Nor yet money that you are told you mustn't spend. There ought to be a "Misfit Presents' Emporium," where you could take all the presents you don't care about and get them exchanged for what you do.

"Please, sir, can I have a nice lot of the newest books with the prettiest pictures for four Jack-in-the-boxes, eight dolls (three dressed), a windmill and a Noah's Ark, that only wants Noah and one of his son's wives' legs?"

"Let me see them, miss, please!"

"Can I look at the books on that shelf?"

"Oh, these are the adventure books for Grown-ups," says the man; "children don't read such thing now-a-days—something in the picture-book way, Miss—Little Sambo and the Seven Pious Pigs, or How many Blue Beans make Five?"

But I would know ever so much better, and would have down half-a-dozen Grown-up books that just make your eyes stand out of your head like currants in a ginger-bread bunny. That's what I like. No children's books for me. And I'd have them all chosen as soon as the Presents' Exchange man had made sure that none of the paws were knocked off the green kangaroo, and that the elephant still owned a trunk.

It is a good idea, isn't it? What do you think? About the Exchange, I mean.

Once my Uncle Tom got a birthday present from Aunt Margaret. It was a set of fire-irons for the drawing-room grate! And when her birthday came round Uncle Tom chose for her present—a pipe-rack for the smoking-room!

I think that was fine—and so does Hugh John.

Now I am not complaining. August the tenth is my birthday, and it is a good time for birthdays—being sufficiently long before Christmas. I pity the poor people who were born in early January. Also presents are good at our house, and there are enough of us to change round among ourselves if any mistakes do occur. But what I really want to tell you about is what happened to Little Sarah Brown, who lives just outside our gate.

Sarah's people are very poor and her father makes them poorer by going and drinking—as he says, "To drown Dull Care." My father says if he let Dull Care alone and drowned himself it would be better for every one all round. And that's a good deal for father to say, mind you, because he believes dreadfully in letting people alone.

Well, Little Sarah Brown's mother was ill most of the time. She had a cough and couldn't do washing, so Little Sarah came to our house to run messages and go to the post with big letters when father said so. It was pretty nice for Sarah too, because every second Saturday she got half-a-sovereign from father. He grabbled deep in his pocket until he found a piece of about the size, looked if it was gold, and handed it over to Little Sarah.

Just fancy carrying about real-for-true gold like that! Some people are dreadfully careless. Well, one time Little Sarah went up to the library to get her Saturday's money. Father was mooning about among his books, and shoved something at her, telling her gruffly to be off. He hadn't time to be thanked then, but would see about it on Monday!

And do you know—it was a whole big sovereign he had given her! Now of course he never knew. He wouldn't have found out in twenty centuries, and Little Sarah knew it. She did not notice till she was nearly home, and then she stopped under a lamp-post that was early lighted to look at what was in her hand.

Yes, it was a sovereign. Nothing less!

And, do you know, a bad, bad boy named Pete Bolton came behind Little Sarah and gave her hand a good knock up.

She would have lost it in about two ticks, because Pete Bolton was a perfectly horrid boy, and would have stolen it like nothing at all. Only Little Sarah was upon him with a bound like a tiger, and bit his hand (yes, it was nasty, being very dirty). Only she bit Pete's hand from a sense of duty, and made him let go. She had her face rubbed in the mud, her hair tugged, and all, but she never let go the sovereign—half of which wasn't hers.

There was a girl for you, and yet boys will say that only they are brave! Well, don't you think it was pretty hard for Sarah—harder, I think, after fighting for it than before? You see, she thought of all the nice things she could get for her mother with the extra ten shillings, besides new boots for herself that didn't let in the water, and—oh! a lot of things like that.

Worst of all, she knew that if she did take it back to father he would only shove it in his pocket without noticing. But she said over and over: "Honesty is the best! Honesty is the best!" You see, she could not remember the word "policy," which does not improve the sentiment anyway—to my mind, at least.

So back she went. Father was still mooning about among his books, and just as she expected he took the golden sovereign and shoved it back into his pocket right among pennies and pocket-knives and so on. But he quite forgot to give Sarah her own real half-sovereign. I believe he thought she had picked the coin up off the floor. For he just said, "Thank you," and went on with his work.

And Little Sarah stood there fit to cry.

By and by he noticed the girl and asked what she was waiting for—not unkindly, you know. But, as usual, he was busy and wanted to be left alone.

"Please, sir," said Little Sarah Brown, "my half-sovereign!"

"But I paid you your wages, did I not?"

"Oh, yes, sir; but—"

"Oh, you would like an advance on next week—very well, then." And he pulled out of his pocket the very identical piece of gold that had been Little Sarah's temptation—like mine about the Blue Vase and Mir-row, you remember.

"There!" he said; "now go away! I'm busy!"

"But, please, sir——!"

"WHAT?"

Then Little Sarah burst into tears, and father stared. But after a while he got at the truth—how he had given a whole sovereign in place of a half——

"Very likely—very likely!" said he.

And how Sarah had brought it back—all of her own accord.

"Very unlikely!" he muttered.

And how he had shoved it back into his pocket without noticing——

"Very likely!" he said—to himself this time.

So what did he do, when he had heard all about it, but promise to whack Pete Bolton with his stick the first time he got him. And Sarah began to cry all over again, saying that Pete had no mother and couldn't be expected to know any better.

"Well," said he, "that's as may be! But anyway, I'll be a father to Pete the next time I catch him. I'll teach him to let little girls alone. I've dealt with heaps of Pete Boltons before! Oh, often! Don't you trouble, little girl!"

And he actually got his hat and walked home with Little Sarah, growling all the time. I don't know what he gave her. But, anyway, what he said to her mother made the poor woman so happy that she nearly forgot to be ill. And on Monday I noticed that Little Sarah had new whole shoes and so had her brother Billy. So something must have happened, and though nothing was said, I can pretty well guess what.

So can Hugh John—and you too, my dear Diary. Only we won't tell. But the "Compulsory Man," who makes boys attend school, descended on wicked Pete Bolton, and then the schoolmaster fell on him, so that Pete became a reformed character—this is, so long as he was sore. Then, of course, he forgot, and began playing truant again.

Only after that he let Little Sarah alone. Because, you see, he never knew when, in a narrow lane, he might meet a big man, pulling at a big mustache, and carrying a very big stick. Because the sermons that big man preached with his stick were powerful, and Pete Bolton did not forget them easily.

The End—moral included free of charge, as Hugh John says.