nstitutions. They know us all by our first names, and our lives are as
an open book to them. Kate O'Malley, who has been at Bascom's for so
many years that she is rumored to have stock in the company, may be said
to govern the fashions of our town. She is wont to say, when we express
a fancy for gray as the color of our new spring suit:

"Oh, now, Nellie, don't get gray again. You had it year before last, and
don't you think it was just the least leetle bit trying? Let me show you
that green that came in yesterday. I said the minute I clapped my eyes
on it that it was just the color for you, with your brown hair and all."

And we end by deciding on the green.

The girls at Bascom's are not gossips--they are too busy for that--but
they may be said to be delightfully well informed. How could they be
otherwise when we go to Bascom's for our wedding dresses and party favors
and baby flannels? There is news at Bascom's that our daily paper never
hears of, and wouldn't dare print if it did.

So when Millie Whitcomb, of the fancy goods and notions, expressed her
hunger for a homely heroine, I did not resent the suggestion. On the
contrary, it sent me home in thoughtful mood, for Millie Whitcomb has
acquired a knowledge of human nature in the dispensing of her fancy goods
and notions. It set me casting about for a really homely heroine.

There never has been a really ugly heroine in fiction. Authors have
started bravely out to write of an unlovely woman, but they never have
had the courage to allow her to remain plain. On Page 237 she puts on a
black lace dress and red roses, and the combination brings out unexpected
tawny lights in her hair, and olive tints in her cheeks, and there she
is, the same old beautiful heroine. Even in the "Duchess" books one
finds the simple Irish girl, on donning a green corduroy gown cut square
at the neck, transformed into a wild-rose beauty, at sight of whom a
ball-room is hushed into admiring awe. There's the case of jane Eyre,
too. She is constantly described as plain and mouse-like, but there are
covert hints as to her gray eyes and slender figure and clear skin, and
we have a sneaking notion that she wasn't such a fright after all.

Therefore, when I tell you that I am choosing Pearlie Schultz as my
leading lady you are to understand that she is ugly, not only when the
story opens, but to the bitter end. In the first place, Pearlie is fat.
Not, plump, or rounded, or dimpl