l of water in five minutes."

"Why?"

"My chain of thought began at the door steps we have passed, all
whitened beautifully so as to display every footprint, and all
representing an expenditure of useless, injurious labor in
hearthstoning, that ought to madden an intelligent housemaid. I dont
think our Armande is particularly intelligent; but I am resolved to
spare her knees and her temper in future by banishing hearthstone from
our establishment forever. I shudder to think that I have been walking
upon those white steps and flag ways of ours every day without awakening
to a sense of their immorality."

"I cannot understand why you are always disparaging Armande. And I hate
an ill-kept house front. None of our housemaids ever objected to
hearthstoning, or were any the worse for it."

"No. They would not have gained anything by objecting: they would only
have lost their situations. You need not fear for your house front. I
will order a porch with porphyry steps and alabaster pillars to replace
your beloved hearthstone."

"Yes. That will be clever. Do you know how easy it is to stain marble?
Armande will be on her knees all day with a bottle of turpentine and a
bit of flannel."

"You are thinking of inkstains, Marian. You forget that it does not rain
ink, and that Nelly will hardly select the porch to write her novels
in."

"Lots of people bring ink on a doorstep. Tax collectors and gasmen carry
bottles in their pockets."

"Ask them into the drawing-room when they call, my dear; or, better
still, dont pay them, so that they will have no need to write a receipt.
Let me remind you that ink shews as much on white hearthstone as it can
possibly do on marble. Yet extensive disfigurements of steps from the
visits of tax collectors are not common."

"Now, Ned, you know that you are talking utter nonsense."

"Yes, my dear. I think I perceive Nelly looking out of the window for
us. Here she is at the door."

Marian hastened forward and embraced her cousin. Miss McQuinch looked
older; and her complexion was drier than before. But she had apparently
begun to study her appearance; for her hat and shoes were neat and even
elegant, which they had never been within Marian's previous experience
of her.

"_You_ are not changed in the least," she said, as she gave Conolly her
hand. "I have just been wondering at the alteration in Marian. She has
grown lovely."

"I have been telling her so all day, in the vain hope of gett