d him. Mrs. Beecher
leaned over and asked him, but he offered no explanation. Nothing was
said.

Edward went back to the house with Mr. Beecher; after talking awhile in
the study, the preacher, wishing to show him something, was going
up-stairs with his guest and had nearly reached the second landing when
there was the sound of a rush, the gas was quickly turned low, and two
white figures sped into one of the rooms.

"My dears," called Mr. Beecher.

"Yes, Mr. Beecher," came a voice from behind the door of the room in
question.

"Come here one minute," said Mr. Beecher.

"But we cannot," said the voice. "We are ready for bed. Wait until--"

"No; come as you are," returned Mr. Beecher.

"Let me go down-stairs," Edward interrupted.

"No; you stay right here," said Mr. Beecher.

"Why, Mr. Beecher! How can we? Isn't Edward with you?"

"You are keeping me waiting for you," was the quiet and firm answer.

There was a moment's hesitation. Then the door opened and the figures of
the two girls appeared.

"Now, turn up the gas, please, as it was," said Mr. Beecher.

"But, Mr. Beecher--"

"You heard me?"

Up went the light, and the two beautiful girls of the box stood in their
night-dresses.

"Now, why did you run away?" asked Mr. Beecher.

"Why, Mr. Beecher! How can you ask such a question?" pouted one of the
girls, looking at her dress and then at Edward.

"Exactly," said Mr. Beecher. "Your modesty leads you to run away from
this young man because he might possibly see you under a single light in
dresses that cover your entire bodies, while that same modesty did not
prevent you all this evening from sitting beside him, under a myriad of
lights, in dresses that exposed nearly half of your bodies. That's what
I call a distinction with a difference--with the difference to the
credit neither of your intelligence nor of your modesty. There is some
modesty in the dresses you have on: there was precious little in what
you girls wore this evening. Good night."

"You do not believe, Mr. Beecher," Edward asked later, "in decollete
dressing for girls?"

"No, and even less for women. A girl has some excuse of youth on her
side; a woman none at all."

A few moments later he added:

"A proper dress for any girl or woman is one that reveals the lady, but
not her person."

Edward asked Mrs. Beecher one day whether Mr. Beecher had ever expressed
an opinion of his sister's famous book, Uncle Tom's Cabin, and she told