hushed their talk, and in less than ten minutes a third gold ring was
chucked over the other two that weighed down the widow's finger, and she
walked off with number three as proud as a white peacock.

It took this widow just two days and part of a night to spring her traps
and draw her hooks--but, then, she was a widow.

Sisters, there is a good deal of commotion in our hotel just now. Rural
single ladies talk of going over to the other place.

I had a little hankering in that direction at first, but, come to think
it over, mean to stay where I am. It isn't the house that has done this,
but the bland atmosphere of Long Branch. If that sort of thing is
indigenous to the place--and I mean to test it thoroughly--Russia is
welcome to the Grand Duke; a whole-souled American is good enough for
me. Besides, Russia is an awful cold place, and I don't think I ever
could bring myself to eat cabbage-soup or the roe of a sturgeon.

Sisters, if this sort of thing lies in the atmosphere, don't you think
it would be a good thing for the whole Society to come down here next
summer? A generous diffusion of masculine energy into the course might
be a desirable change. For my part, I don't mean to leave this place
till frost comes. I believe this thing is going to be an epidemic at the
Branch, and when contagions rage I am sure to catch any disease that is
going. I have had the measles twice, and two pretty severe tugs with the
scarlet-fever. In fact, I was celebrated, as a child, for catching
double. One thing is certain--I never ran away because a disease was
catching, and I'm not going to do it here. On the contrary, I am making
over one of my old alpaca skirts into a bathing-dress. If I know myself
I shall fight it out on that line, if it takes all winter.

CHAPTER XC.

THE YELLOW FLAG.

Dear sisters:--I have gone and done it! Now let me give you a little
wholesome advice. It comes out of my superior knowledge of the world,
and experience of the human heart. Never say that you won't do a thing,
because if you do, just as sure as you live it is the very thing that
you are sure to plunge into, whether you want to or not. Besides, people
who know enough to doubt themselves, understand that men and women are
made up principally of human nature. Now human nature is a great fraud,
and isn't to be trusted when he's found in the interior of your own
heart, or anywhere else.

In one of my reports, I expressed myself as shocke