r own
purchasing with real money.

For example, Jane needs a spool of blue sewing-silk and a yard of
elastic; so two little girls, intrusted with a silver quarter, trot
hand in hand to Mr. Meeker's. They match the silk with anxious care, and
watch the clerk jealously while he measures the elastic, to make sure
that he doesn't stretch it. Then they bring back six cents change,
receive my thanks and praise, and retire to the ranks tingling with a
sense of achievement.

Isn't it pathetic? Ordinary children of ten or twelve automatically know
so many things that our little incubator chicks have never dreamed of.
But I have a variety of plans on foot. Just give me time, and you
will see. One of these days I'll be turning out some nearly normal
youngsters.

LATER.

I've an empty evening ahead, so I'll settle to some further gossip with
you.

You remember the peanuts that Gordon Hallock sent? Well, I was so
gracious when I thanked him that it incited him to fresh effort. He
apparently went into a toy shop, and placed himself unreservedly in the
hands of an enterprising clerk. Yesterday two husky expressmen deposited
in our front hall a crate full of expensive furry animals built to be
consumed by the children of the rich. They are not exactly what I should
have purchased had I been the one to disburse such a fortune, but my
babies find them very huggable. The chicks are now taking to bed with
them lions and elephants and bears and giraffes. I don't know what the
psychological effect will be. Do you suppose when they grow up they will
all join the circus?

Oh, dear me, here is Miss Snaith, coming to pay a social call.

Good-by.

S.

P.S. The prodigal has returned. He sends his respectful regards, and
three wags of the tail.

THE JOHN GRIER HOME,

April 7. My dear Judy:

I have just been reading a pamphlet on manual training for girls,
and another on the proper diet for institutions--right proportions of
proteins, fats, starches, etc. In these days of scientific charity, when
every problem has been tabulated, you can run an institution by chart.
I don't see how Mrs. Lippett could have made all the mistakes she did,
assuming, of course,that she knew how to read. But there is one quite
important branch of institutional work that has not been touched upon,
and I myself am gathering data. Some day I shall issue a pamphlet on the
"Management and Control of Trustees."

I must tell you the joke about my enem