appliqued laces.

There seemed to be no need of introductions. Everybody appeared to
be acquainted. There was no awkwardness, no constraint. The assembly
disengaged an impression of refined pleasure. On every hand, innumerable
dialogues seemed to go forward easily and naturally, without break or
interruption, witty, engaging, the couple never at a loss for repartee.
A third party was gracefully included, then a fourth. Little groups were
formed,--groups that divided themselves, or melted into other groups,
or disintegrated again into isolated pairs, or lost themselves in
the background of the mass,--all without friction, without
embarrassment,--the whole affair going forward of itself, decorous,
tactful, well-bred.

At a distance, and not too loud, a stringed orchestra sent up a pleasing
hum. Waiters, with brass buttons on their full dress coats, went from
group to group, silent, unobtrusive, serving salads and ices.

But the focus of the assembly was the little space before Hartrath's
painting. It was called "A Study of the Contra Costa Foothills," and
was set in a frame of natural redwood, the bark still adhering. It was
conspicuously displayed on an easel at the right of the entrance to the
main room of the club, and was very large. In the foreground, and to
the left, under the shade of a live-oak, stood a couple of reddish cows,
knee-deep in a patch of yellow poppies, while in the right-hand corner,
to balance the composition, was placed a girl in a pink dress and white
sunbonnet, in which the shadows were indicated by broad dashes of pale
blue paint. The ladies and young girls examined the production with
little murmurs of admiration, hazarding remembered phrases,
searching for the exact balance between generous praise and critical
discrimination, expressing their opinions in the mild technicalities of
the Art Books and painting classes. They spoke of atmospheric effects,
of middle distance, of "chiaro-oscuro," of fore-shortening, of the
decomposition of light, of the subordination of individuality to
fidelity of interpretation.

One tall girl, with hair almost white in its blondness, having observed
that the handling of the masses reminded her strongly of Corot, her
companion, who carried a gold lorgnette by a chain around her neck,
answered:

"Ah! Millet, perhaps, but not Corot."

This verdict had an immediate success. It was passed from group to
group. It seemed to imply a delicate distinction that carri