or too expensive, you could have explained to her the reason why it was impossible, and then, between you, something could have been selected that would have pleased both. As it was, your girl went home, looked at herself in the glass and made up her mind she was ugly; that it didn't make any difference what she did, that nobody cared for her because she was ugly and that nobody ever would. And she suffered as only a sensitive girl can suffer. And I would like to warn you, my friend, that the sins you commit against your children will certainly, either here or hereafter, rise up very black before you.
I know of two women who were told, when they were children, that they were ugly. One of them brooded over it, was hurt by it, never ceased thinking of it, was awkward and shy, until one day, when she was about sixteen, she met a man who loved her and who married her. He laughed at the idea of her being ugly; he took her to a mirror and showed her a pair of bright eyes, and he told her that her hair was beautiful. She was slender, it is true, and a bit sallow, but a year's travel and a year's love, and a year's constant belief that after all she was not ugly, made her, if not a beautiful, at least an attractive woman, while becoming dresses brought about ease of manner, and the ugly duckling, to everybody's surprise, was counted among the swans. But to this day she
