ACCIDENTS.
"Amelia see what I have brought you," said Mrs. Joyce to her little
girl.
"What is it mother?"
"A most beautiful little doll."
"Oh, goody! mother, how glad I am."
"Well, my little girl, I am glad to see that you like the doll; but
wait till morning, and then you can see her plainly."
The next day was occupied in admiring me. Her mother said,
"Amelia, now you must be very careful of this doll. Her name is
Josephine Arnoldson."
"Oh yes, mother, I shall be very careful of her indeed." But in a week
my little mother began to be rather careless of me; she left me all
around the house, and very often left me in the barn and wood-house all
night.
One day, when, as usual, she had left me on the sofa, a fat old lady
came in and sat on me, and broke one of my arms. All the time that she
was sitting on me, she hurt me dreadfully, and I could not speak, she
suffocated me so. After she had gone, my mother found me, and said,
"Oh, oh, my dear child! how much you must have suffered, to have had
old Mrs. Jones sit on you, and I do declare if your arm is not broken!"
Her mother who stood by, said,
"Amelia, she would not have been broken if you had not left her about;
in future you must look out where you leave her; and to-night I will
get your father to mend her arm."
My next accident was thus: Amelia's brother took me by the arm and
flung me round the room, and then suddenly let me drop, and cracked a
piece out of my head. I was taken to a shop where I had my head mended.
One can scarcely notice the mark, except a little very white spot,
whiter than the rest of my body. One day Amelia was washing me, and
she held me too near the fire to dry me, when my hair caught, and in
a moment was all in flames. I screamed with all my might, and so did
my mother; and her nursery-maid caught me up and soused me in a basin
of water. Such a fright as I was! my hair was all burned off. It was
some time before I got over my fright and pain. The next week I was
taken to the city, where a barberess made me another wig. One day a
large Newfoundland dog took me up in his mouth, and run away with me
only in fun, but I was terribly frightened. In a day he brought me home
again, much to the relief of my mother and myself. My mother told me
that she had suffered very much for my absence, and she was going to
give me up for lost, (for one of her servants said that she had better
hunt for me, but after a while she said she couldn't,) when her maid
came running up with me, and said that she had just found me on the
front-door step. In a month I had my right leg broken very badly, but
after a while it got well again. My mother carried me out to walk, when
the same dog snatched me away, and took me to my present mother.
[Illustration: _La Grange Place P 81_]