resses, are the tulips and roses--very charming, and delightful,
and sweet, but fit for nothing on earth but parlor ornaments."

"Well, parlor ornaments are good in their way," said the young lady,
coloring, and looking a little vexed.

"So you give up the point, then," said the gentleman, "that you girls
are good for--just to amuse yourselves, amuse others, look pretty, and
be agreeable."

"Well, and if we behave well to our parents, and are amiable in the
family--I don't know--and yet," said Florence, sighing, "I have often
had a sort of vague idea of something higher that we might become; yet,
really, what more than this is expected of us? what else can we do?"

"I used to read in old-fashioned novels about ladies visiting the sick
and the poor," replied Edward. "You remember Coelebs in Search of a
Wife?"

"Yes, truly; that is to say, I remember the story part of it, and the
love scenes; but as for all those everlasting conversations of Dr.
Barlow, Mr. Stanley, and nobody knows who else, I skipped those, of
course. But really, this visiting and tending the poor, and all that,
seems very well in a story, where the lady goes into a picturesque
cottage, half overgrown with honeysuckle, and finds an emaciated, but
still beautiful woman propped up by pillows. But come to the downright
matter of fact of poking about in all these vile, dirty alleys, and
entering little dark rooms, amid troops of grinning children, and
smelling codfish and onions, and nobody knows what--dear me, my
benevolence always evaporates before I get through. I'd rather pay any
body five dollars a day to do it for me than do it myself. The fact is,
that I have neither fancy nor nerves for this kind of thing."

"Well, granting, then, that you can do nothing for your fellow-creatures
unless you are to do it in the most genteel, comfortable, and
picturesque manner possible, is there not a great field for a woman like
you, Florence, in your influence over your associates? With your talents
for conversation, your tact, and self-possession, and ladylike gift of
saying any thing you choose, are you not responsible, in some wise, for
the influence you exert over those by whom you are surrounded?"

"I never thought of that," replied Florence.

"Now, you remember the remarks that Mr. Fortesque made the other evening
on the religious services at church?"

"Yes, I do; and I thought then he was too bad."

"And I do not suppose there was one of you ladie