l off."

Miss Farringdon looked sternly at the speaker. "Never again let me hear
you refer to the income of persons about whom you are speaking,
Elisabeth; it is a form of ill-breeding which I can not for a moment
tolerate in my house. That money is a convenience to the possessor of
it, I do not attempt to deny; but that the presence or the absence of it
should be counted as a matter of any moment (except to the man himself),
presupposes a standpoint of such vulgarity that it is impossible for me
to discuss it. And even the man himself should never talk about it; he
should merely silently recognise the fact, and regulate his plan of life
accordingly."

"Still, I have heard quite nice people sometimes say that they can not
afford things," argued Elisabeth.

"I do not deny that; even quite nice people make mistakes sometimes, and
well-mannered persons are not invariably well-mannered. Your quite nice
people would have been still nicer had they realized that to talk about
one's poverty--though not so bad as talking about one's wealth--is only
one degree better; and that perfect gentle-people would refer neither to
the one nor to the other."

"I see." Elisabeth's tone was subdued.

"I once knew a woman," continued Miss Farringdon, "who, by that accident
of wealth, which is of no interest to anybody but the possessor, was
enabled to keep a butler and two footmen; but in speaking of her
household to a friend, who was less richly endowed with worldly goods
than herself, she referred to these three functionaries as 'my
parlourmaid,' for fear of appearing to be conscious of her own
superiority in this respect. Now this woman, though kind-hearted, was
distinctly vulgar."

"But you have always taught me that it is good manners to keep out of
sight any point on which you have the advantage over the people you are
talking to," Elisabeth persisted. "You have told me hundreds of times
that I must never show off my knowledge after other people have
displayed their ignorance; and that I must not even be obtrusively
polite after they have been obviously rude. Those are your very words,
Cousin Maria: you see I can give chapter and verse."

"And I meant what I said, my dear. Wider knowledge and higher breeding
are signs of actual superiority, and therefore should never be flaunted.
The vulgarity in the woman I am speaking about lay in imagining that
there is any superiority in having more money than another person: there
is not. T