will already have felt a little sorry for Maria, and you will have
thought that I might have chosen a prettier name for her. And so I
might. But I did not do the choosing. Her parents did that. And they
called her Maria after an aunt who was disagreeable, and would have been
more disagreeable than ever if the baby had been called Enid or Elaine
or Vivien, or any of the pretty names that will readily occur to you.
She was called Toodlethwaite after the eminent uncle of that name who
had an office in London and an office in Liverpool, and was said to be
rolling in money.

'I _should_ like to see Uncle Toodlethwaite rolling in his money,' said
Maria, 'but he never does it when I'm about.'

The third name, Carruthers, was Maria's father's name, and she often
felt thankful that it was no worse. It might so easily have been Snooks
or Prosser.

Of course no one called Maria Maria except Aunt Maria herself. Her Aunt
Eliza, who was very refined, always wrote in the improving books that
she gave Maria on her birthday, 'To dearest Marie, from her affectionate
Aunt Elise,' and when she spoke to her she called her Mawrie. Her
brothers and sisters, whenever they wanted to be aggravating, called her
Toodles, but at times of common friendliness they called her Molly, and
so did most other people, and so shall I, and so may you.

Molly and her brothers and sisters were taken care of by a young woman
who was called a nursery-governess. I don't know why, for she did not
nurse them, and she certainly did not govern them. In her last situation
she had been called a lady-help--I don't know the why of that, either.
Her name was Simpshall, and she was always saying 'Don't,' and 'You
mustn't do that,' and 'Put that down directly,' and 'I shall tell your
mamma if you don't leave off.' She never seemed to know what you ought
to do, but only what you oughtn't.

One day the children had a grand battle with all the toy soldiers, and
the little brass cannons that shoot peas, and the other kind that shoot
pink caps with '_Fortes Amorces_' on the box.

Bertie, who always liked to have everything as real as possible, did
not like the soldiers to be standing on the bare polished mahogany of
the dining-table.

'It's not a bit like the field of glory,' he said. And indeed it was
not.

So he borrowed the large kitchen knife-box and went out, and brought it
in full of nice real clean mould out of the garden. Half a dozen
knife-box-fulls were needed