To Rosy's mother all this involved no impropriety. Eliza Marshall's
Chicago was the Chicago of 1860, an Arcadia which, in some dim and
inexplicable way, had remained for her an Arcadia still--bigger, noisier,
richer, yet different only in degree, and not essentially in kind. She
herself had traversed these same streets in the days when they were the
streets of a mere town, Fane, accompanying her mother's courses as a
child, had seen the town develop into a city. And now Rosy followed in
her turn, though the _urbs in horto_ of the earlier time existed only
in the memory of "old settlers" and in the device of the municipal
seal, while the great Black City stood out as a threatening and evil
actuality. Mild old Mabel had drawn them all in turn or together, and had
philosophized upon the facts as little as any of them; but Rosy's brother
(who had been about, and who knew more than he was ever likely to tell)
looked round at her now and then with a vague discomfort.

"There!" called their mother, suddenly; "did you see that?" A big lumpish
figure on the crossing had loomed up at the mare's head, a rough hand had
seized her bridle, and a raw voice with a rawer brogue had vented a piece
of impassioned profanity on both beast and driver. "Well, I don't thank
that policeman for hitting Mabel on the nose, I can tell him. August,
did you get his number?"

"No'm," answered the coachman. He turned round familiarly. "I got his
breath."

"I should think so," said Truesdale. "And such shoes as they have, and
such hands, and such linen! Didn't that fellow see what we were? Couldn't
he realize that we pay for the buttons on his coat? Mightn't he have
tried to apprehend that we were people of position here long before he