t the least idea," answered Clara, slightly
gaping--"a thousand dollars, perhaps."

"A thousand dollars! What, for a gentleman who keeps his coach--lives
in Broadway--dresses his daughter as I dress, and gives her
hundred-dollar handkerchiefs. Two hundred million, my dear; two hundred
million!"

Eudosia had interpolated the word "hundred," quite innocently, for, as
usually happens with those to whom money is new, her imagination ran
ahead of her arithmetic. "Yes," she added, "two hundred millions;
besides sixty millions of odd money!"

"That sounds like a great deal," observed Clara quietly; for, besides
caring very little for these millions, she had not a profound respect
for her friend's accuracy on such subjects.

"It IS a great deal. Ma says there are not ten richer men than Pa in
the state. Now, does not this alter the matter about the
pocket-handkerchief? It would be mean in me not to have a
hundred-dollar handkerchief, when I could get one."

"It may alter the matter as to the extravagance; but it does not alter
it as to the fitness. Of what USE is a pocket-handkerchief like this? A
pocket-handkerchief is made for USE, my dear, not for show."

"You would not have a young lady use her pocket-handkerchief like a
snuffy old nurse, Clara?"

"I would have her use it like a young lady, and in no other way. But it
always strikes me as a proof of ignorance and a want of refinement when
the uses of things are confounded. A pocket-handkerchief, at the best,
is but a menial appliance, and it is bad taste to make it an object of
attraction. FINE, it may be, for that conveys an idea of delicacy in
its owner; but ornamented beyond reason, never. Look what a tawdry and
vulgar thing an embroidered slipper is on a woman's foot."

"Yes, I grant you that, but everybody cannot have hundred-dollar
handkerchiefs, though they may have embroidered slippers. I shall wear
my purchase at Miss Trotter's ball to-night."

To this Clara made no objection, though she still looked disapprobation
of her purchase. Now, the lovely Eudosia had not a bad heart; she had
only received a bad education. Her parents had given her a smattering
of the usual accomplishments, but here her superior instruction ended.
Unable to discriminate themselves, for the want of this very education,
they had been obliged to trust their daughter to the care of
mercenaries, who fancied their duties discharged when they had taught
their pupil to repeat like a parr