Theodora R. Jenness

“ I am glad I have the teachers' side."
"If you do not think hard you will have a heart that is a dark place, like the scrub-pail closet, and it will he hard to keep it clean of wrong thoughts, like the white mother talked about in Sunday-school. The motto means inside of us as well as places where we live. I like to think hard," said Cordelia Running Bird. "I heard the teacher tell the white mother that I had the best memory of any middle-sized girl, and she said it was as good as many white girls' memories of my age, and that is 'most fourteen. ”

“ Susie knows the motions in the Jack Frost song so well the teachers says that she can motion with the children in the Christmas entertainment."
"She does not motion right," said Hannah Straight Tree. "She gets behind, and when they sing:
"'He nips little children on the nose,
He pinches little children on the toes,
He pulls little children by the ears,
And brings to their eyes the big, round tears,'
she is only nipping her nose when the rest are pulling their ears." ”

“ Hannah Straight Tree said, with deepening gloom. "He would let Lucinda, but he says Dolly is too short; she must be ten birthdays when she comes. Lucinda loves Dolly, so she will not leave her, and my stepmother is cross-tempered. Lucinda will be twenty-one birthdays—much too old to come to school—when Dolly is ten birthdays."
"You can tell your father the teachers like the Indian children come to school when they are very short, so they can grow them more white-minded," said Cordelia Running Bird. ”

“ The unclean water froze upon the stairs, and Cordelia Running Bird's work of thawing it with hot water was a long and painful process. When it was accomplished, though but poorly, she went upstairs a second time, passing through the front hall to the white mother's room to report that she had spoken in Dakota.
"Again, Cordelia? How can you forget so often?" said the young white mother in a seriously inquiring tone.
The little Indian girl's excitement had now given place to discouragement. She was silent for some time, then she murmured an original defense. ”

“ If Dolly's father saw her looking very pretty in a red dress and a brown shoes and stockings, just like he would feel so happier he would let her come to school. Then Lucinda would be glad, and she would learn the neat way, and they would grow Dolly more white-minded. The verse I read yesterday was a King's Daughters' verse. Helen marked it—Annie, too.
"What if Annie should be looking down from up there,"—pointing to a newly glimmering star—"and speaking just like this: 'Dear Cordelia, these words I tell you—" It is more blessed to give than to receive." ”

“ But Indian girls must learn as well as white girls to respect the right of property. The girls have been allowed much freedom in the spending of what money they could call their own, but it has mostly gone for hair ribbons and candy, and there has been no trouble before. I hope the feeling will subside, however, in a day or two. So many Christmas pleasures are in prospect that the girls will surely have no room for strife and envy in their hearts."
Here the teachers hastened to the mission building to discharge the duties that devolved upon them after Sunday-school. ”

“ Hannah Straight Tree to Cordelia Running Bird.
"Because you have the teachers' side, and that's always nicer, to begin with, than the girls' side," answered Cordelia Running Bird. "You know the teachers never walk whole-feet when you are scrubbing. If they have to go by, they walk tiptoe, and their toes are sharp and clean and do not make big tracks. ”

“ Hannah Straight Tree did not hunt the dustpan, but with perseverance worthy of a better cause, she brushed the sweepings from her floor and stairs upon a ragged palm-leaf fan which she discovered in a corner, and, dropping them into the scrub-pail, took them out of doors. Cordelia brought a shoe-box from her cupboard in the playroom and applied it as an inconvenient dustpan. Meanwhile dustpan Number 8 remained in the darkest corner of the middle dormitory closet, where it had been pushed in the rush of clearing up the day before. ”

“ She does the extra work herself, cheerfully and neatly, if not speedily, but closely watched by others. She has learned as if by intuition that variety is the spice of life, but she seems unconscious of the fact that she makes the other girls discontented. ”

“ She must be thinking very hard."
"She is going on the mourner's walk," observed the girl who kept the playroom. "When an Indian walks alone, so far and very slow, that means they are too sad. She cannot be happy, for the large girls—only me—and the middle-sized girls do not talk to her. Then, too, of course, she thinks of Annie. It was just one year ago this Monday that they took her to the agency. The large girls did not wash, because there was a funeral."
"And Cordelia Running Bird was so proud because the girls all cried," said Hannah. ”

“ The reckless speech was repeated to the dormitory girls by Hannah
Straight Tree, much to their displeasure.
"The dormitory girls are shovel-feeted, and she wishes they could not walk one step, only lie in bed!" exclaimed the largest girl, sitting down on a straw-tick to discuss the matter. "Then we should be cripples, and, tokee! how many cripples there would be!" ”

“ Cordelia's big sister is now in heaven, and Cordelia wrote good-by to you from Annie. My big sister is now in the First Reader, but she cannot help it, for my mother died, and so Lucinda had to stay at home and keep Dolly, and that is my little sister.
"And it was about Susie—that is Cordelia's little sister— that I got so mean and jealous, for she had a nice Christmas things—two kinds—and Dolly would not have one kind, and she would look so horrid. So I called Cordelia Running Bird proud, vain, cross, mean. And I talked about her so the girls got cross at her. ”

“ And after the Christmas tree my father told the teachers (and Emma Two Bears was interpreter) : 'Your school is a good place, for it makes the Indian children very smart, and you treat the Indian visitors very kind, so I shall let Dolly stay, and then Lucinda will stay, too.' Very fast Lucinda stopped being sad, for she thought before my father would not let Dolly stay till she was ten birthdays, and Lucinda loves her so she would not stay without her. ”

“ Here the young Sioux girl, who was compelled to battle with hereditary pride and stubbornness in every effort to do right, forgot the white mother's admonition that the heart might be a dark place and a cold place needing to be cleansed of evil thoughts. ”

“ You talk so good because your father wears a grand policeman's coat and trousers, and your mother's head is in a hood!" said Hannah Straight Tree, excitedly. "My father wears a very funny Indian clothes, and feathers in his hairs, and my big sister's head is in a shawl. All the girls will say on Christmas, 'Susie looked just like a fairy in the Jack Frost song. We shall give her very lots of candy from our Christmas bags.' Dolly knows the Jack Frost motions ”

“ But all the children on my side walk whole-feet over the wet floor when I am scrubbing, and their shoes are big and muddy. Ugh! big tracks they make! But I have learned the motto, every word, and I can speak that when I feel discouraged with my work. ”

“ The large and middle-sized girls must not see them till the entertainment, but the little girls keep saying they are like the ones the little white visitor that wore the dress that was pink dim-i-ty, had on. ”

“ She has found the dustpan, too, because she is so scared of me. She bragged so much she made me cross, so I told her she must find it and take up my dirt, yesterday. She minded me this morning."
"She will be more scared before we speak to her," remarked the bread girl. "Ver-r-y ugly issue shoes! ”