living in the same place. When I began to go about again, one day Cordelia Martin (she was a Bleecker—your father will remember her) met me in the street and asked me to come in the next evening informally to dinner and meet her sister, an army officer's wife, who would be there en route from one post to another, and have an old-time game of whist.

"I went, glad to see old friends, and anticipating a pleasant evening. I wore a new soft black satin gown slightly V in front, some of my best lace, and my pearl ornaments; I even wondered if the latter were in good taste at a family dinner. You know I never dwell much upon attire, but it is sometimes necessary when it is in a way epoch making.

"A butler had supplanted Cordelia's usual cordial waitress; he presented a tray for the card that I had not brought and said 'second story front.' This seemed strange to me, as Cordelia herself had always come to the stairway to greet me when the door opened.

"The 'second story front' had been done over into a picturesque but useless boudoir, a wood floor polished like glass was dotted by white fur islands; the rich velvet carpets, put down a few years before, had in fact disappeared from the entire house. A maid, anything but cordial, removed my wrap, looking me and it over very deliberately as she did so. I wondered if by mistake I had been bidden to a grand function—no, there were no visible signs of other guests.

"Not a word was spoken, so I made my way down to where the library living-room had been, not a little curious to see what would come next. Thick portières covered the doorway, and by them stood the butler, who asked my name. Really, for a moment I could not remember it, I was so startled at this sudden ceremony in the house of a friend, of such long standing that I had jumped rope on the sidewalk with her, making occasional trips arm-in-arm around the corner to Taffy John's little shop for molasses peppermints and 'blubber rubbers.'

"My hesitation seemed to add to the distrust that my appearance had in some way created. The butler also swept me from head to foot with his critical stare, and at the same moment I became internally aware that I had forgotten to remove my arctic over-boots. Never mind, my gown was long, I would curl up my toes, but return to the dressing-room in full sight of that man, I whose forbears had outbowled Peter Stuyvesant, and, I fear, outdrunk him—never! Then the portières flew apart, and facing a glare of bilious-hued electric light, I heard the shouted announcement of 'Miss Doormat' as I stumbled over a tiger rug into the room. I believe the fellow did it on purpose. However, it was very funny, and my rubber-soled arctics probably prevented my either coasting straight across into the open fireplace, or having a nasty fall, while the laugh that the announcement created on the part of my host, Archie Martin, saved me from an awkward moment, for from a sort of gilt throne-like arrangement at one side of the hearth, arrayed in brocaded satin gowns cut very low and very long, heads crimped to a crisp, and fastened to meagre shoulders by jewelled collars, the whole topped by a group of three 'Prince of Wales' feathers, Cordelia and her sister came forward two steps to greet me.

"Of course, I thought to myself, they are going to a ball later on. I naturally made no comment, and we went in to dinner. The dining room was very cold, as extensions usually are, and the ladies presently had white fur capes brought to cover their exposure, while I, sitting in the draught from the butler's pantry, was grateful for my arctics. The meal was more pretentious than edible,—a strange commentary upon many delightful little four or at most five course affairs I had eaten in the same room. I soon found that there was no ball in prospect, also that Cordelia and her sister seemed ill at ease, while Archie had a look of suppressed mischief on his face, which in spite of warning signals broke forth as soon as, the coffee being served, the butler left.

"One great comfort about men is that they do not take easily to being unnatural. Archie and I, having been brought up like brother and sister from the time we went to a little mixed school over in old Clinton Hall, were always on cordial terms.

"'Well, Lavvy,' he began, 'I see you're surprised at the change of base here, and I'm going to let you in on the ground floor, if Cordelia won't. You see, Janet (she's not in town to-night, by the way) is coming out next month, and we are getting in training for what her mother thinks is her duty toward her, or else what they both think is their duty to society, or something else equally uncomfortable.'

"'Archie!' remonstrated Cordelia, but he good-naturedly ignored her and continued: 'Now I want Janet to have a jolly winter and marry a good fellow when the time comes, but as we've got the nicest sort of friends, educated and all that, who have travelled along with us, as you have, from the beginning, why should we change our habits and feathers and try to fly for a different roost?'

"'Archibald,' said Cordelia, in such a tone that she was not to be gainsaid, 'Lavinia, as a woman of the world, will understand what you refuse to: that it is very important that our daughter should have the surroundings that are now customary to the social set with whom she has been educated, and into which, if she is to be happy, she must marry. If she is to meet the right people, she must be rightly presented. All her set wear low gowns at dinner, whether guests are present or not, just as much as men wear their evening dress at night and their business suits in the morning. That we have kept up our old-fogy habits so long has nothing to do with the present question.'

"'Except that I have to strain my purse to bring up everything else to suit the clothes, as naturally gaslight, a leg of mutton, and two vegetables do not make a good foreground to bare shoulders and a white vest! And I'd rather fund the cash as a nest-egg for Jenny.'

"'Archie, you are too absurd!' snapped Cordelia, yet more than half inclined to laugh; for she used to be the jolliest woman in the world before the spray of the Whirlpool got into her eyes.

"'As to meeting suitable people to marry, and all that rubbish,' pursued Archie, relentlessly, 'I was considered fairly eligible in my time, and did you meet me at any of the dances you went to, or at the Assemblies at Fourteenth Street Delmonico's that were the swell thing in those days? No; I pulled you out of an old Broadway stage that had lost a wheel and keeled over into a pile of snow opposite father's office, when you were practically standing on your head. You didn't fuss, and I got to know you better in five minutes than any one could in five years of this rotten fuss and feathers.'

"'That was purely accidental, and I wish you wouldn't mention it so often,' said Cordelia, flushing; and so the conversation, at first playful, gradually working toward a painful dispute, went on, until my faithful Lucy came to escort me home, without our having our game of whist, that excuse for intelligent and silent companionship."

* * * * *

"January 25th.

"I dwelt on that little dinner episode, my dear Barbara, because in it you will find an answer to several questions I read between your lines. Since my return I find that practically all my old friends have flown to what Archie Martin called 'a different roost,' or else failing, or having no desire so to do, have left the city altogether, leaving me very lonely. Not only those with daughters to bring out, but many of my spinster contemporaries are listed with the buds at balls and dinner dances, and their gowns and jewels described. Ah, what a fatal memory for ages one has in regard to schoolmates! Josephine