e inaugurated any extensive
housekeeping. Moreover, they could see their city friends whenever they
chose for an hour or two at a time without the trouble of providing a
feast or a band of music. They always had bread and butter and fruit and
various appetizing knickknacks stored away, so that if a caller stayed
till any one was hungry a sufficient lunch could be served on the spot.

But they exercised their hospitality chiefly for the benefit of their
country friends whom they could not otherwise see. Many a nice old lady
or bright young girl passed a week with them, who would otherwise have
hurried through her season's shopping in a day and have had no time left
for music or pictures. Most of these friends could amuse themselves very
well through the day. If they did not know the way about, one of the
hostesses conducted them to the libraries or museums as she went her own
way to her daily occupation. There was always bread and cheese for them
to eat if they chose, and if they cared for something more they could
find it at a restaurant as their entertainers did, or they could cook it
for themselves in the hospitable little kitchen. A folding bed could
always be let down for them at night, and in times of stress another bed
could be made on the sofa.

The hostesses spent little money or thought or time on their guests,
except so far as they really wanted to do so, and yet they entertained
great numbers of people most satisfactorily. They did not ask anybody to
visit them from a sense of duty, but they always asked everybody they
fancied they should like to see without a thought as to convenience,
because it always was convenient to have anybody they liked with them.
We know that men enjoy giving invitations in this free way, but they
seldom have the power--for two reasons; either their wives are not
satisfied to entertain the friends of their husbands in simple every-day
fashion, or the husbands themselves are not satisfied to have them so
entertained.

Every one knows the great difference between city and country
hospitality. Very few people in the city appear to be really pleased to
see an uninvited guest, and they are far less likely to invite guests,
except perhaps when giving a party, than those of the same means in the
country. They are not altogether to blame in this. There are so many
more people to see in the city than in the country that every one
becomes a new burden, and the friendship must be very close