bonbon dishes.  It was plain that Flossy admired her because she recognized her to be a fine and superior soul, and the appreciation of this served to make it more easy not to repine at the difference between their entertainments.  Still the constant acquisition of pretty things by her frank and engaging friend was an ordeal which only a soul endowed with high, stern democratic faith and purpose could hope to endure with equanimity.  Flossy bought new adornments for her house and her person with an amiable lavishness which required no confession to demonstrate that her husband was making money.  She made the confession, though, from time to time with a bubbling pride, never suspecting that it could harass or tempt her spiritual looking friend.  She prattled artlessly of theatre parties followed by a supper at one of the fashionable restaurants, and of new acquaintances whom she entertained, and through whom her social circle was enlarged, without divining that the sprightly narration was a thorn in the flesh of her hearer.  Selma was capricious in her reception of these reports of progress.  At times she listened to them with grave, cold eyes, which Flossy took for signals of noble disdain and sought to deprecate by wooing promises to be less worldly.  At others she asked questions with a feverish, searching curiosity, which stimulated Mrs. Williams’s free and independent style into running commentaries on the current course of social events and the doings and idiosyncracies of contemporary leaders of fashion whom she had viewed from afar.  One afternoon Selma saw from her window Flossy and her husband drive jubilantly away in a high cart with yellow wheels drawn by a sleek cob, and at the same moment she became definitely aware that her draught from the cup of life had a bitter taste.  Why should these people drive in their own vehicle rather than she?  It seemed clear to her that Wilbur could not be making the best use of his talents, and that she had both a grievance against him and a sacred duty to perform in his and her own behalf.  Justice and self-respect demanded that their mutual light should no longer be hid under a bushel.

CHAPTER V.

Pauline Littleton was now established in her new lodgings.  Having been freed by her brother’s marriage from the responsibilities of a housewife, she was able to concentrate her attention on the work in which she was interested.  Her classes absorbed a large portion of her time.  The remainder was devoted to writing to girls in other cities who sought her advice in regard to courses of study, and to correspondence, consultation, and committee meetings with a group of women in New York and elsewhere, who like herself were engrossed in educational matters.  She was glad to have the additional time thus afforded her for pursuing her own tastes, and the days seemed too short for what she wished to accomplish.  She occupied two pleasant rooms within easy walking distance of her brother’s house.  Her classes took her from home four days in the week, and two mornings in every seven were spent at her desk with her books and papers, in the agreeable labor of planning and correspondence.