Page 59 - pollyanna

CHAPTER VIII. POLLYANNA

PAYS A VISIT

t was not long before life at the Harrington homestead
Isettled into something like order—though not exactly
the order that Miss Polly had at first prescribed. Pollyanna
sewed, practised, read aloud, and studied cooking in the
kitchen, it is true; but she did not give to any of these things
quite so much time as had first been planned. She had more
time, also, to ‘just live,’ as she expressed it, for almost all of
every afternoon from two until six o’clock was hers to do
with as she liked—provided she did not ‘like’ to do certain
things already prohibited by Aunt Polly.
It is a question, perhaps, whether all this leisure time was
given to the child as a relief to Pollyanna from work—or as a
relief to Aunt Polly from Pollyanna. Certainly, as those first
July days passed, Miss Polly found occasion many times to
ejaculate ‘What an extraordinary child!’ and certainly the
reading and sewing lessons found her at their conclusion
each day somewhat dazed and wholly exhausted.
Nancy, in the kitchen, fared better. She was not dazed
nor exhausted. Wednesdays and Saturdays came to be, in-
deed, red-letter days to her.
There were no children in the immediate neighborhood
of the Harrington homestead for Pollyanna to play with. The

Pollyanna