XIV.
GOING WITH THE CROWD.
“But all the girls went, mother. I didn’t like to be the only one left out. Besides, when I said I wouldn’t go they all laughed at me and said that I was a coward.”
It was Wednesday morning, before school time, and Anna was dreading to go back to school—dreading to meet her teacher. The day before a circus had been in town. At recess, while the children were on the playground, they heard the noise of the band, and one of the girls said:
“Let’s go and see the parade.”
“All right,” said Anna. “I’ll go and ask the teacher if we may.”
“No; don’t ask her—she might say no. We can get back before the bell rings, and she will never know that we left the grounds.”
Anna and one or two other girls held back. They all knew that it was against the rules to go off the playground at recess without permission.
“Oh, come on! Come on!” insisted one of the girls. “You’re afraid; you’re afraid! Come on! Don’t be such a coward; all the rest are going.”
And so Anna went.
When the girls saw the parade pass one point they wanted to see it once more, and away they went through the cross street to get to another corner ahead of the procession. School was forgotten; and when they did remember, recess time was long past and it was too late to go back.
The next morning, as Anna stood in the kitchen talking it over with her mother, her little heart was very heavy. She knew she had done wrong; she dreaded to go to school; and she was very unhappy.
“Perhaps,” said her mother, “if you had been brave about not going, the other girls would have stayed on the school grounds too. Or, if you had asked the teacher, I think she would have let you all go. But whether she did or not, it is never safe to do a thing just because ‘all the rest do it.’ Going with the crowd is not a good plan unless you are sure that the crowd is going in the right direction. The only wise thing for you to do is to be sure you are right, and then stick to it and never mind what the crowd does.”
“I didn’t mean to do wrong,” said Anna, as the tears started in her eyes.
“Mother, I’m so Happy. Teacher Forgave Me.”
“I know that, my dear,” said her mother, “but you were more afraid of being teased than you were of doing wrong. I hope you will remember from this day forward that the brave girl is not the girl who dares to do wrong, but the brave girl is the one who does what she knows to be right, in spite of the taunts and jeers of her playmates.”
“What shall I tell my teacher?” asked Anna in a low voice, as she dropped her head.
“Oh,” said her mother, kissing her, “you go right straight to your teacher and tell her that you have done wrong, and that you are sorry for it. Ask her to let you say so to the whole school. Be sure to beg her pardon, and promise not to do so again.”
Little Anna did as her mother told her. That afternoon, when she came back from school, she ran into her mother’s arms and said:
“Mother, I’m so happy. Teacher forgave me, and I mean to be good.”
And the smile on Anna’s face spoke plainly of a happy heart.