woman of ambition.

Eden Place was frequented mostly by the children, who found it an
admirable spot to squabble, to fight, and to dig up the hapless
earth; and after them, by persons out of suits with fortune. These
(generally men) adorned the shabby benches at all times, sleeping,
smoking, reading newspapers, or tracing uncertain patterns in the
gravel with a stick,--patterns as uncertain and aimless as
themselves. There were fewer women, because the unemployed woman of
this class has an old-fashioned habit, or instinct, of seeking work
by direct assault; the method of the male being rather to sit on a
bench and discuss the obstacles, the injustices, and the unendurable
insults heaped by a plutocratic government in the path of the honest
son of toil.

The corner house of Eden Place was a little larger than its
neighbours in the same row. Its side was flanked by a sand-lot, and
a bay window, with four central panes of blue glass, was the most
conspicuous feature of its architecture. In the small front yard was
a microscopic flower-bed; there were no flowers in it, but the stake
that held up a stout plant in the middle was surmounted by a neat
wooden sign bearing the inscription, 'No Smoking on these Premises.'
The warning seemed superfluous, as no man standing in the garden
could have put his pipe in his mouth without grazing either the fence
or the house, but the owner of the 'premises' possibly wished to warn
the visitor at the very threshold.

All the occupied houses in Eden Place were cheerful and hospitable in
their appearance, and were marked by an air of liveliness and good-
fellowship. Bed linen hung freely from all the windows, for there