at which the question of getting into love or not getting in is a matter
of will--quite a thing of choice. At the same time, drawing back is a
tame dance, and the best of all is to stay balanced awhile.'

'You do that well, I'll warrant.'

'Well, no; for what between continually wanting to love, to escape the
blank lives of those who do not, and wanting not to love, to keep out of
the miseries of those who do, I get foolishly warm and foolishly cold by
turns.'

'Yes--and I am like you as far as the "foolishly" goes. I wish we poor
girls could contrive to bring a little wisdom into our love by way of a
change!'

'That's the very thing that leading minds in town have begun to do, but
there are difficulties. It is easy to love wisely, but the rich man may
not marry you; and it is not very hard to reject wisely, but the poor man
doesn't care. Altogether it is a precious problem. But shall we clamber
out upon those shining blocks of rock, and find some of the little yellow
shells that are in the crevices? I have ten minutes longer, and then I
must go.'




7. THE DINING-ROOM OF A TOWN HOUSE--THE BUTLER'S PANTRY


A few weeks later there was a friendly dinner-party at the house of a