girls have been taught what they
wouldn't have learnt but for Lady Ogram's kindness."

"Admirable!" murmured Mr. Gallantry. "True philanthropy, and true
patriotism!"

"Beyond a doubt," agreed Dyce. "Lady Ogram deserves well of her
country."

"There's just one way," remarked Mrs. Gallantry, "in which, it seems to
me, she could have deserved better. Don't be angry with me, Lady Ogram;
you know I profit by your example in saying just what I think. Now, if,
instead of a mill, you had built a training institution for domestic
service--"

"Bah!" broke in the hostess. "How you harp on that idea! Haven't you
any other?"

"One or two more, I assure you," replied Mrs. Gallantry, with the
utmost good-humour. "But I particularly want to interest you in this
one. It's better that girls should work in a mill in the country than
go to swell the population of slums; I grant you that. But how much
better still for them to work in private houses, following their
natural calling, busy with the duties of domestic life. They're getting
to hate that as much as their menfolk hate agricultural labour; and
what could be a worse symptom or a greater danger?"

"Pray," cried Lady Ogram, in her grating voice, "how would a servants'
school have helped the village?"

"Not so quickly, perhaps, but in time. With your means and influence,
Lady Ogram, you might have started an institution which would be the
model of its kind for all England. Every female child in Shawe would
have had a prospect before her, and the village would have attracted
decent poor families, who might somehow have been helped to support
themselves--"

Lady Ogram waved her hand contemptuously.

"Somehow! That's the way with your conservative-reform women. Somehow!
Always vague, rambling notions--"

"Conservative-reform!" exclaimed Mrs. Gallantry, showing a little
pique, though her face was pleasant as ever. "Surely your own ideas are
to a great extent conservative."

"Yes, but there's a liberal supply of common sense in them!" cried the
hostess, so delighted to have made a joke that she broke into cackling
laughter, and laughed until failure of breath made her gasp and wriggle
in her chair, an alarming spectacle. To divert attention, Constance
began talking about the mill, describing the good effect it had wrought
in certain families. Dyce listened with an air almost as engrossed as
that of Mr. Gallantry, and, when his moment came, took up the
conversation.

"Mrs.