ng girl or feller is
subject to that sort of ailment, 'cordin' to the records. S'pose one
of your circle's daughters gets to keepin' company with a chap who's
outside the ring? A promisin', nice boy enough, but poor, and a rank
outsider? Mean to say she sha'n't marry him if she wants to."

"Certainly! That sort of marriage is never a happy one, unless, of
course, the girl is wealthy enough not to care. And even then it is not
advisable. All their customs and habits of thought are different. No!
Emphatically, no! And the girl, if she is sensible and well reared, as I
have said, will understand it is impossible."

"My soul and body! Then you mean to tell me that she _must_ look out for
some chap in her crowd? If she ain't got but just enough to keep inside
the circle--this grand whirlamagig you're tellin' me about--if she's
pretendin' up to the limit of her income or over, then it's her duty,
and her ma and pa's duty, to set her cap for a man who's nigher the
center pole in the tent and go right after him? Do you tell me that?
That's a note, I must say!"

Mrs. Dunn's foot beat a lively tattoo on the rug. "I don't know what you
mean by a 'note,'" she commented, with majestic indignation. "I have
not lived in South Denboro, and perhaps my understanding of English
is defective. But marriages among cultivated people, _society_ people,
intelligent, ambitious people are, or should be, the result of thought
and planning. Others are impossible!"

"How about this thing we read so much about in novels?--Love, I believe
they call it."

"Love! Love is well enough, but it does not, of itself, pay for proper
clothes, or a proper establishment, or seats at the opera, or any of
the practical, necessary things of modern life. You can't keep up a
presentable appearance on _love_! If I had a daughter who lacked the
brains to understand what I had taught her, that is, her duty as a
member of good society, and talked of making a love match, I would....
But there! You can't understand, I suppose."

She rose and shook the wrinkles from her gown. Captain Elisha
straightened in his chair. "Why, yes, ma'am," he drawled, quietly; "yes,
ma'am, I guess I understand fust-rate."

And suddenly Mrs. Dunn also understood. Her face, which had grown almost
too red for one attached to a member of polite society, grew redder
still. She turned away and walked to the window.

"What nonsense we've been talking!" she said, after a moment's silence.
"I d