push on, and get into business, and get great warehouses, until at last,
without ancestors, or family, or name, or estate--'

'Or the merest scrap of heirloom or family jewel.'

'Or heirlooms, or family jewels, they are thought as much of as if their
forefathers had glided unobtrusively through the peerage--'

'Ever since the first edition.'

'Yes.' Mrs. Belmaine, who really sprang from a good old family, had been
going to say, 'for the last seven hundred years,' but fancying from
Ethelberta's addendum that she might not date back more than a trifling
century or so, adopted the suggestion with her usual well-known courtesy,
and blushed down to her locket at the thought of the mistake that she
might have made. This sensitiveness was a trait in her character which
gave great gratification to her husband, and, indeed, to all who knew
her.

'And have you any theory on the vexed question of servant-government?'
continued Mrs. Belmaine, smiling. 'But no--the subject is of far too
practical a nature for one of your bent, of course.'

'O no--it is not at all too practical. I have thought of the matter
often,' said Ethelberta. 'I think the best plan would be for somebody to
write a pamphlet, "The Shortest Way with the Servants," just as there was
once written a terribly stinging one, "The Shortest Way with the
Dissenters," which had a great effect.'

'I have always understood that that was written by a dissenter as a