For the Major

id her pride base itself upon the fact that she was her father's daughter. She had been proud of this from her birth. Her features were rather irregular, delicate. Ordinarily she had not much color. Her straight, soft thick hair of dark brown was put plainly back from her oval face, and this face was marked by the slender line of eyebrows of the same dusky hue, and lighted by two gray eyes, which were always, in their fair, clear color, a sort of surprise when the long, dark lashes were lifted.

"I wonder that you take the trouble," she said, referring to the proposed reception.

The blue orbs of Madam Carroll dwelt upon her for a moment. "We must fill our position," she answered. "We did not make it; it has been allotted to us. Its duties are therefore our duties."

"But are they real duties, mamma? May they not be fictitious ones? If we should drop them for a while--as an experiment?"

"If we should drop them," answered Madam Carroll--"if we should drop them, Far Edgerley, socially s