“Bless your heart, child!  I suspect you know more about the Bible this minute than I do.  Mother was too busy taking care of you two, when I was a little chicken, to teach me as she has you.”

“Well, but what can that mean—­’If a man strikes you on one cheek, let him strike the other too?’”

“Yes,” said Alfred, chiming in, “and, ’If anybody takes your coat away, give him your cloak too.’”

“I suppose it means just that,” said Sadie.  “If anybody steals your mittens, as that Bush girl did yours last winter, Julia, you are to take your hood right off, and give it to her.”

“Oh, Sadie! you don’t ever mean that.”

“And then,” continued Sadie, gravely, “if that shouldn’t satisfy her, you had better take off your shoes and stockings, and give her them.”

“Sadie,” said Ester, “how can you teach those children such nonsense?”

“She isn’t teaching me any thing,” interrupted Alfred.  “I guess I ain’t such a dunce as to swallow all that stuff.”

“Well,” said Sadie, meekly, “I’m sure I’m doing the best I can; and you are all finding fault.  I’ve explained to the best of my abilities Julia, I’ll tell you the truth;” and for a moment her laughing face grew sober.  “I don’t know the least thing about it—­don’t pretend to.  Why don’t you ask Ester?  She can tell you more about the Bible in a minute, I presume, than I could in a year.”

Ester laid her book on the window.  “Julia, bring your Bible here,” she said, gravely.  “Now what is the matter?  I never heard you make such a commotion over your lesson.”

“Mother always explains it,” said Alfred, “and she hasn’t got back from Mrs. Vincent’s; and I don’t believe anyone else in this house can do it.”

“Alfred,” said Ester, “don’t be impertinent.  Julia, what is that you want to know?”

“About the man being struck on one cheek, how he must let them strike the other too.  What does it mean?”

“It means just that, when girls are cross and ugly to you, you must be good and kind to them; and, when a boy knocks down another, he must forgive him, instead of getting angry and knocking back.”

“Ho!” said Alfred, contemptuously, “I never saw the boy yet who would do it.”

“That only proves that boys are naughty, quarrelsome fellows, who don’t obey what the Bible teaches.”

“But, Ester,” interrupted Julia, anxiously, “was that true what Sadie said about me giving my shoes and stockings and my hood to folks who stole something from me?”

“Of course not.  Sadie shouldn’t talk such nonsense to you.  That is about men going to law.  Mother will explain it when she goes over the lesson with you.”

Julia was only half satisfied.  “What does that verse mean about doing good to them that—­”

“Here, I’ll read it,” said Alfred—­“’But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you.’”