costumes," said Mrs. Peterkin, who
already found her Elizabethan ruff somewhat stiff; "but, alas! I could
not get at my best dress."

"The company is filling all the upper rooms," said Elizabeth Eliza; "we
cannot go back."

At this moment the little boys returned from the front door, and in a
subdued whisper explained that the lady from Philadelphia was arriving.

"Oh, bring her here!" said Mrs. Peterkin. And Solomon John hastened to
meet her.

She came, to find a strange group half lighted by the Chinese lanterns.
Mr. Peterkin, in his white toga, with a green wreath upon his head, came
forward to address her in a noble manner, while she was terrified by the
appearance of Agamemnon's ass's head, half hidden among the leaves.

"What shall we do?" exclaimed Mr. Peterkin. "There are no Peterkins;
yet we have sent cards to everybody that they are 'At Home'!"

The lady from Philadelphia, who had been allowed to come without
costume, considered for a moment. She looked through the windows to the
seething mass now crowding the entrance hall. The Hindu snake-charmers
gambolled about her.

"_We_ will receive as the Peterkin family!" she exclaimed. She
inquired for a cap of Mrs. Peterkin's, with a purple satin bow, such as
she had worn that very morning. Amanda was found by a Hindu, and sent
for it and for a purple cross-over shawl that Mrs. Peterkin was wont to
wear. The daughters of the lady from Philadelphia put on some hats of
the little boys and their India-rubber boots. Hastily they went in
through the back door and presented themselves, just as some of the
wavering guests had decided to leave the house, it seeming so quiet
and sepulchral.

The crowd now flocked into the parlors. The Peterkins themselves left
the hollyhocks and joined the company that was entering; Mr. Peterkin,
as Julius Caesar, leading in Mrs. Peterkin, as Queen Elizabeth. Mrs.
Peterkin hardly knew what to do, as she passed the parlor door; for one
of the Osbornes, as Sir Walter Raleigh, flung a velvet cloak before
her. She was uncertain whether she ought to step on it, especially as
she discovered at that moment that she had forgotten to take off her
rubber overshoes, which she had put on to go through the garden. But
as she stood hesitating, the lady from Philadelphia, as Mrs. Peterkin,
beckoned her forward, and she walked over the ruby velvet as though it
were a door-mat.

For another surprise stunned her,--there were three Mrs. Peterkins! N