"I'd trust it to you, anyhow. The two Stephens girls and Letty Rowe, Sally Prentiss and Agnes Green. That makes six, with Betty. We haven't quite decided on the others. I dare say some of the girls will be mad as hornets at being left out, but there can be only nine. Of course we do not count Jane."

These were all very nice girls of well-to-do families. Mrs. Leverett did feel a little proud that Betty should head the list.

"They are all to bring their sewing. I had half a mind to put on a quilt, but I knew there'd be a talk right away about Jane marrying, and she has no steady company. I tell her she can't have until she is eighteen."

"That's plenty young enough. I don't suppose there will be any dancing?"

"They've decided on proverbs and forfeits. Cousin Morris is coming round to help the boys plan it out. Are you real set against dancing, Elizabeth?"

"Well--I'm afraid we are going on rather fast, and will get to be too trifling. I can't seem to make up my mind just what is right. Foster thinks we have been too strait-laced."

"I danced when I was young, and I don't see as it hurt me any. And some of the best young people here-about are going to a dancing class this winter. Joseph has promised to join it, and his father said he was old enough to decide for himself."

Mrs. Morse had finished her sewing and folded it, quilting her needle back and forth, putting her thimble and spool of cotton inside and slipping it in her work bag. Then she rose and wrapped her shawl about her and tied on her hood.

"Then we may count on Warren and Betty? Give them my love and Jane's, and say we shall be happy to see them a week from Thursday, Betty at three and Warren at seven. Come over soon, do."

When she had closed the door on her friend Mrs. Leverett glanced over to the corner where Doris sat with her book. She had half a mind to ask her not to mention the call to Betty, then she shrank from anything so small.

Doris studied and she sewed. Then Betty came in flushed and pretty.

"I didn't have the stitch quite right," she said to her mother. "And I have been telling her about Doris. She wants me to bring her over some afternoon. She is a little curious to see what kind of lace Doris makes.

She has a pillow--I should call it a cushion."

"Doris ought to learn plain sewing----"

"Poor little mite! How your cares will increase. Can I take her over to Mme. Sheafe's some day?"

"If there is ever any time," with a sigh.

"Do you know your spelling?" She flew over to Doris and asked a question with her eyes, and Doris answered in the same fashion, though she had a fancy that she ought not. Betty took her book and found that Doris knew all but two words.

"If I could only do sums as easily," she said, with a plaintive sound in her voice.

"Oh, you will learn. You can't do everything in a moment, or your education would soon be finished."

"What is Mme. Sheafe like?" she asked with some curiosity, thinking of Aunt Priscilla.

"She is a very splendid, tall old lady. She ought to be a queen. And she was quite rich at one time, but she isn't now, and she lives in a little one-story cottage that is just like--well, full of curious and costly things. And now she gives lessons in embroidery and lace work, and hemstitching and fine sewing, and she wears the most beautiful gowns and laces and rings."

"Your tongue runs like a mill race, Betty."

"I think everybody in Boston is tall," said Doris with quaint consideration that made both mother and daughter laugh.

"You see, there is plenty of room in the country to grow," explained Betty.

"Can I do some sums?"

"Oh, yes."

Plainly, figures were a delusion and a snare to little Doris Adams. They went astray so easily, they would not add up in the right amounts. Mrs.

Webb did not like the children to count their fingers, though some of them were very expert about it. When the child got in among the sevens, eights, and nines she was wild with helplessness.

Supper time came. This was Warren's evening for the debating society, which even then was a great entertainment for the young men. There would be plenty of time to give them the invitation. Mrs. Leverett was sorry she had consented to Betty's going, but it would have made ill friends.

The next day Mrs. Hollis Leverett, the eldest son's wife, came up to spend the day, with her two younger children. Doris was not much used to babies, but she liked the little girl. The husband came up after supper and took them home in a carryall. Doris was tired and sleepy, and couldn't stop to do any sums.

Betty was folding up her work, and Warren yawning over his book, when Mrs. Leverett began in a rather jerky manner:

"Mrs. Morse was in and invited you both to Jane's birthday party next Thursday night."

"Yes, I saw Joe in the street to-day, and he told me," replied Warren.

"I said I'd see about you, Betty. You are quite too young to begin party-going."

"Why, I suppose it's just a girl's frolic," said her father, wincing suddenly. "They can't help having birthdays. Betty will be begging for a party next."

"She won't get it this year," subjoined her mother dryly. "And, by the looks of things, we have no money to throw away."

Betty looked a little startled. She had wanted so to really question Doris, but it did not seem quite the thing to do. And perhaps she was not to go, after all. She would coax her father and Warren, she would do almost anything.

Warren settled it as they were going up to bed. His mother was in the kitchen, mixing pancakes for breakfast, and he caught Betty's hand.

"Of course you are to go," he said. "Mother doesn't believe in dealing out all her good things at once. I wish you had something pretty to wear. It's going to be quite fine."

"Oh, dear," sighed Betty. "Jane has such pretty gowns. But of course I have only been a little school-girl until this year, and somehow it is very hard for the mothers to think their girls are grown-up in any respect except that of work."

Warren sighed as well, and secretly wished he had a regular salary, and could do what he liked with a little money. His father was training him to take charge of his own business later on. He gave him his board and clothing and half a dollar a week for spending money. When he was twenty-one there would be a new basis, of course. There was not much call for money unless one was rich enough to be self-indulgent. One couldn't spend five cents for a trolley ride, even if there was a downpour of rain. And as Mr. Leverett had never smoked, he had routed the first indications of any such indulgence on the part of his son.

The amusements were still rather simple, neighborly affairs. The boys and girls "spent an evening" with each other and had hickory nuts, cider, and crullers that had found their way from Holland to Boston as well as New York. And when winter set in fairly there was sledding and skating and no end of jest and laughter. Many a decorous love affair sprang into shy existence, taking a year or two for the young man to be brave enough to "keep company," if there were no objections on either side. And this often happened to be a walk home from church and an hour's sitting by the family fireside taking part in the general conversation.

To be sure, there was the theater. Since 1798, when the Federal Street Theater had burned down and been rebuilt and opened with a rather celebrated actress of that period, Mrs. Jones, theater-going was quite the stylish amusement of the quality. Mr. Leverett and his wife had gone to the old establishment, as it was beginning to be called, to see the tragedy of "Gustavus Vasa," that had set Boston in a furore. They were never quite settled on the point of the sinfulness of the pleasure.

Indeed, Mr. Leverett evinced symptoms of straying away from the old landmarks of faith. He had even gone to the preaching of that reprehensible young man, Mr. Hosea Ballou, who had opened new worlds of thought for his consideration.

"It's a beautiful belief," Mrs. Leverett admitted, "but whether you can quite square it with Bible truth----"

"I'm not so sure you can square the Westminster Catechism either."

"If you must doubt, Foster, do be careful before the children. I'm not sure but the old-fashioned religion is best. It made good men and women."

"Maybe if you had been brought up a Quaker you wouldn't have seen the real goodness of it. Isn't belief largely a matter of habit and education? Mind, I don't say religion. That is really the man's life, his daily endeavor."

"Well, we won't argue." She felt that she could not, and was ashamed that she was not more strongly fortified. "And do be careful before the children."

Her husband was a good, honest, upright man--a steady churchgoer and zealous worker in many ways. The intangible change to liberalness puzzled her. If you gave up one point, would there not be a good reason for giving up another?

Neither could she quite explain why she should feel more anxious about Betty than she had felt about the girlhood of the two elder daughters.

Of course Warren accepted the invitations for himself and his sister. If her new white frock was only done! She had outgrown her last summer's gowns. There was a pretty embroidered India muslin that her sister Electa had given her. If she might put a ruffle around the bottom of the skirt.