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in with those strong-minded Bloomer women, would you, and sail the ship on my own account, independently of my husband?"

      Now, the merest allusion to modern strong-mindedness in woman was to Aunt Maria like a red rag to a bull; it aroused all her combativeness.

      "No; I am sure I wouldn't," she said, with emphasis. "If there's anything, Eva, where I see the use of all my instructions to you, it is the good sense with which you resist all such new-fangled, abominable notions about the rights and sphere of women. No; I've always said that the head of the woman is the man; and it's a wife's duty to live to please her husband. She may try to influence him – she ought to do that – but she never ought to do it openly. I never used to oppose Mr. Wouvermans. I was always careful to let him suppose he was having his own way; but I generally managed to get mine," and Aunt Maria plumed herself and nodded archly, as an aged priestess who is communicating to a young neophyte secrets of wisdom.

      In her own private mind, Eva thought this the most terrible sort of hypocrisy; but her aunt was so settled and contented in all her own practical views, that there was not the least use in arguing the case. However, she couldn't help saying, innocently,

      "But, Aunty, I should be afraid sometimes he would have found me out, and then he'd be angry."

      "Oh, no; trust me for that," said Aunt Maria, complacently. "I never managed so bunglingly as that. Somehow or other, he didn't exactly know how, he found things coming round my way; but I never opposed him openly – I never got his back up. You see, Eva, these men, if they do get their backs up, are terrible, but any of them can be led by the nose – so I'm glad to find that you begin the right way. Now, there's your mother – I've been telling her this morning that it's her duty to make your father go back into business and retrieve his fortunes. He's got a good position, to be sure – a respectable salary; but there's no sort of reason why he shouldn't die worth his two or three millions as well as half the other men who fail, and are up again in two or three years. But Nellie wants force. She is no manager. If I were your father's wife, I should set him on his feet again pretty soon. Nellie is such a little dependent body. She was saying this morning how would she ever have got along with her family without me! But there are some things that even I can't do – nobody but a wife could, and Nelly isn't up to it."

      "Poor, dear little mamma," said Eva. "But are you quite sure, Aunt Maria, that her ways are not better adapted to papa than any one's else could be? Papa is very positive, though so very quiet. He is devoted to mamma. Then, again, Aunty, there is a good deal of risk in going, into speculations and enterprises at papa's age. Of course, you know I don't know anything about business or that sort of thing; but it seems to me like a great sea where you are up on the wave to-day and down to-morrow. So if papa really won't go into these things, perhaps it's all for the best."

      "But, Eva, it is so important now for the girls, poor things, just going into society – for you know they can't keep out of it, even if you do. It will affect all their chances of settlement in life – and that puts me in mind, Eva, something or other must be done about Alice and Jim Fellows. Everybody is saying if they're not engaged they ought to be."

      "Oh, Aunty, how exasperating the world is! Can't a man and woman have a plain, honest friendship? Jim has shown himself a true friend to our family. He came to us just in all the confusion of the failure, and helped us heart and hand in the manliest way – and we all like him. Alice likes him, and I don't wonder at it."

      "Well, are they engaged?" said Aunt Maria, with an air of statistical accuracy.

      "How should I know? I never thought of asking. I'm not a police detective, and I always think that if my friends have anything they want me to know, they'll tell me; and if they don't want me to know, why should I ask them?"

      "But, Eva, one is responsible for one's relations. The fact is, such an intimacy stands right in the way of a girl's having good offers – it keeps other parties off. Now, I tell you, as a great secret, there is a very fine man, immensely rich, and every way desirable, who is evidently pleased with Alice."

      "Dear me, Aunty! how you excite my curiosity. Pray who is it?" said Eva.

      "Well, I'm not at liberty to tell you more particularly; but I know he's thinking about her; and this report about her and Jim would operate very prejudicially. Now shall I have a talk with Alice, or will you?"

      "Oh, Aunty dear, don't, for pity's sake, say a word to Alice. Young girls are so sensitive about such things. If it must be talked of, let me talk with Alice."

      "I really thought, if I had a good chance, I'd say something to the young man himself," said Aunt Maria, reflectively.

      "Oh, good heavens! Aunty, don't think of it. You don't know Jim Fellows."

      "Oh, you needn't be afraid of me," said Aunt Maria. "I am a great deal older and more experienced than you, and if I do do anything, you may rest assured it will be in the most discreet way. I've managed cases of this kind before you were born."

      "But Jim is the most peculiar" —

      "Oh, I know all about him. Do you suppose I've seen him in and out in the family all this time without understanding him perfectly?"

      "But I don't really think that there is the least of anything serious between him and Alice."

      "Very likely. He would not be at all the desirable match for Alice. He has very little property, and is rather a wild, rattling fellow; and I don't like newspaper men generally."

      "Oh, Aunty, that's severe now. You forget Harry."

      "Oh, well, your husband is an exception; but, as a general rule, I don't like 'em – unprincipled lot I believe," said Aunt Maria, with a decisive nod of her head. "At any rate, Alice can do better, and she ought to."

      The ringing of the lunch bell interrupted the conversation, much to the relief of Eva, who discovered with real alarm the course her respected relative's thoughts were taking.

      Of old she had learned that the only result of arguing a point with her was to make her more set in her own way, and she therefore bent all her forces of agreeableness to produce a diversion of mind to other topics. On the principle that doctors apply mustard to the feet, to divert the too abundant blood from the head, Eva started a brisk controversy with Aunt Maria on another topic, in hopes, by exhausting her energies there, to put this out of her mind. With what success her strategy was crowned, it will remain to be seen.

       CHAPTER VI

      THE SETTLING OF THE WATERS

      It will not be doubted by those who know the ways of family dictators that Mrs. Maria Wouvermans left Eva's house after her day's visit in a state of the most balmy self-satisfaction, as one who has done a good day's work.

      "Well, I've been up at Eva's," she said to her sister, as she looked in on returning, "and really it was well I went in. That Mary of hers is getting careless and negligent, just as all old servants do, and I just went over the whole house, and had a plain talk with Mary. She flew up about it, and was impertinent, of course; but I put her down, and I talked plainly to Eva about the way she's beginning with her servants. She's just like you, Nellie, slack and good-natured, and needs somebody to keep her up. I told her the way she is beginning – of petting Mary, and fussing up her room with carpet and pictures, and everything, just like any other – wouldn't work. Servants must be kept in their places."

      Now, Mrs. Van Arsdel had a spirit of her own; and the off-hand, matter-of-fact manner in which her sister was accustomed to speak of her as no manager touched a vital point. What housekeeper likes to have her capacity to guide a house assailed? Is not that the spot where her glory dwells, if she has any? And it is all the more provoking when such charges are thrown out in perfect good nature, not as designed to offend, but thrown in par parenthèse, as something everybody would acknowledge, and too evident to require discussion. While proceeding in the main part of a discourse Mrs. Wouvermans was quite in the habit of these frank side disclosures of her opinion of her sister's management, and for the most part they were submitted to in acquiescent silence, rather than to provoke a controversy; but to be called "slack" to her face without protest or rejoinder was more than she could bear; so Mrs. Van Arsdel spoke up with spirit:

      "Maria,

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