self.

She had had a darling mother, full of love and tenderness, and Elsie
would say to herself, "I must not forget the things mama told me, 'Love
can never die, and kind words can never die.'" But she had no one to
love, and she never heard any kind words; so she was a bit worried.
"I shall forget how kind words sound, and I shall forget how to love,"
sighed the little girl.

She used to long for a doll or cat or something she could call her own
and talk to. She asked Miss Amanda, who said "No." She added, "I have
no money to give for such foolishness as a doll, and a cat would eat its
head off."

Miss Amanda had been blessed with no little-girl time. When she was
young, she always had been forced to work hard, and she thought it was
no worse for Elsie than it had been for herself. I don't suppose it was;
but one looking in on these two could not but feel for both of them.

Elsie would try to talk to herself a little at night, but it was
cheerless. Then she would lift up her knee, and draw the sheet about it
for a hood, and call it a little girl. She named it Nancy Pullam, and
would try to love that; but it almost broke her back when she tried to
hug Nancy. "Oh, if I had something to be good to"! she said.

So she began greeting the ladies, when she opened the door, with a
cheerful little "Good morning" or "Good afternoon."

"I wouldn't do that," said Miss Amanda, "it looks forward and pert. It
is their place to say 'Good morning,' not yours. You have no occasion
to speak to your betters, and, anyway, children should be seen and not
heard."

One day, a never-forgotten day, she went down cellar to the bin of
potatoes to select some for dinner. She was sorting them over and laying
out all of one size, when she took up quite a long one, and lo! it had a
little face on it and two eyes and a little hump between for a nose and
a long crack below that made a very pretty mouth.

Elsie looked at it joyfully. "It will make me a child," she said, "no
matter if it has no arms or legs; the face is everything."

She carefully placed it at the end of the bin, and whenever she could
slip away without neglecting her work would run down cellar and talk
softly to it.

But one day her potato-child was gone! Elsie's heart gave a big jump,
and then fell like lead, and seemed to lie perfectly still; but it
commenced to beat again, beat and ache, beat and ache!

She tried to look for the changeling; but the tears made her so tha