"I'm so glad!" she sighed happily. "I thought it would never come
my turn!"
"You should have had it a week ago, but Huldah Meserve upset the
ink bottle over her star, and we had to baste on another one.
You are the last, though, and then we shall sew the stars and
stripes together, and Seth Strout will get the top ready for
hanging. Just think, it won't be many days before you children
will be pulling the rope with all your strength, the band will be
playing, the men will be cheering, and the new flag will go
higher and higher, till the red, white, and blue shows against
the sky!"
Rebecca's eyes fairly blazed. "Shall I 'hem on' my star, or
buttonhole it?" she asked.
"Look at all the others and make the most beautiful stitches you
can, that's all. It is your star, you know, and you can even
imagine it is your state, and try and have it the best of all.
If everybody else is trying to do the same thing with her state,
that will make a great country, won't it?"
Rebecca's eyes spoke glad confirmation of the idea. "My star, my
state! " she repeated joyously. "Oh, Mrs. Baxter, I'll make such
fine stitches you'll, think the white grew out of the blue!"
The new minister's wife looked pleased to see her spark kindle a
flame in the young heart. "You can sew so much of yourself into
your star," she went on in the glad voice that made her so win-
some, "that when you are an old lady you can put on your specs
and find it among all the others.
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