e talks and jokes a great deal," said Watts.

"I never knew any one who is deceiving herself so about a man," said
Dorothy. "It's terrible. What do you think she had the face to say to me
to-day?"

"What?"

"She was speaking of their plans after returning from the wedding
journey, and she said: 'I am going to have Peter keep up his bachelor
quarters.' 'Does he say he'll do it?' I asked. 'I haven't spoken to
him,' she replied, 'but of course he will.' I said: 'Leonore, all women
think they rule their husbands, but they don't in reality, and Peter
will be less ruled than any man I know.' Then what do you think she
said?"

"Don't keep us in suspense."

"She said: 'None of you ever understood Peter. But I do.' Think of it!
From that little chit, who's known Peter half the number of months that
I've known him years!"

"I don't know," sighed Lispenard. "I'm not prepared to say it isn't so.
Indeed, after seeing Peter, who never seemed able to understand women
till this one appeared on the scene, develop into a regulation lover, I
am quite prepared to believe that every one knows more than I do. At the
same time, I can't afford to risk my reputation for discrimination and
insight over such a simple thing as Peter's character. You've all tried
to say what Peter is. Now I'll tell you in two words and you'll all find
you are right, and you'll all find you are wrong."

"You are as bad as Leonore," cried Dorothy.

"Well," said Watts, "we are all listening. What is Peter?"

"He is an extreme type of a man far from uncommon in this country, yet
who has never been understood by foreigners, and by few Americans."

"Well?"

"Peter is a practical idealist"

CHAPTER LXI.

LEONORE'S THEORY.

And how well had that "talk-it-over" group at the end of Peters
wedding-day grasped his character? How clearly do we ever gain an
insight into the feelings and motives which induce conduct even in those
whom we best know and love? Each had found something in Peter that no
other had discovered. We speak of rose-colored glasses, and Shakespeare
wrote, "All things are yellow to a jaundiced eye." When we take a bit of
blue glass, and place it with yellow, it becomes green. When we put it
with red, it becomes purple. Yet blue it is all the time. Is not each
person responsible for the tint he seems to produce in others? Can we
ever learn that the thing is blue, and that the green or purple aspect
is only the tinge which we ourselv