irls of your class. Such affairs
are possible only in large dance halls, and to do them impressively
costs the proprietor some money. The guests rent costumes and masks and
appear in very gala fashion indeed. They dance in the rays of all kinds
of colored lights thrown upon them from upper galleries. During part of
a waltz the dancers are bathed in rose-colored lights, which change
suddenly to purple, a blue, or a green. Some very weird effects are
made, the lights being so manipulated that the dancers' shadows are
thrown, greatly magnified, on walls and floor. At intervals a rain of
bright-colored confetti pours down from above. The scene becomes
bacchanalian. Color, light, music, confetti, the dance, together
combine to produce an intense and voluptuous intoxication which the
revelers deepen with drink.

The events of the latter part of that night were very vague in Sadie's
memory when she awoke late the next morning. She remembered that she had
tolerated familiarities which had been foreign to her experience
heretofore, and that she had been led home by some friendly soul, at
daylight, almost helpless from liquor.

Frightened, haunted by half-ashamed memories of that dance, Sadie
spoiled a good bit of her work on Monday morning. The forewoman
descended on her with a torrent of coarse abuse, whereupon Sadie rose
suddenly from her machine, and in a burst of hysterical profanity and
tears rushed out of the factory, vowing never to return. There was only
one course, she decided, for her to take, and she took it.

"Sadie, why did you do it?" wailed Rosie the next time they met.

"It's better than the factory," said Sadie.

Tucking muslin underwear is dull work, but it is, in most ways, a more
agreeable task than icing cakes in a St. Louis biscuit factory. All day
Edna M---- stood over a tank filled with thick chocolate icing. The
table beside Edna's tank was kept constantly supplied with freshly baked
"lady-fingers," and these in delicate handfuls Edna seized and plunged
into the hot ooze of the chocolate. Her arms, up to the elbows, went
into the black stuff, over and over again all day. At noon, over their
lunch, the girls talked of their recreations, their clothes, their
"fellows."

Edna had not very much to contribute to the girls' stories of gayety and
adventure. She led a quieter existence than most of the other girls,
although her leanings were toward lively pleasures. She was engaged to a
young man who work