to others,' you know," said Clemence,
doubtingly.

"But you had _not_ ought. Just leave matters as they are, and they will
come right of themselves, and if they don't, why, it's no fault of
yours."

"That strikes me as a selfish policy," she said. "I can't reconcile it
with my ideas of what is right."

"It's a safe one, for all that," was the reply. "Take heed to my words,
and let the Owen's affairs alone. You don't expect to revolutionize the
family by one effort."

"Still, I can't help but feel sorry for this overworked woman," said
Clemence, "and what is more, I think as one of my own sex, I may be able
to do her some kindness without injury to any one. She has neither grace
nor refinement, such as most women have in common with each other,
whatever may be their position in life. I don't think that she is
naturally lazy, as you say. At the foundation, her house is always
clean. It needs somebody to keep it in order, and have a place for
everything and everything in its place,' for the lack of which it
presents this disordered appearance. I believe I can be of some use to
her, and shall try faithfully to do my whole duty in that respect."

"You dear child," said Mrs. Swan, kindly, "you shame me by your
disinterestedness. Remember, though, if you get into any difficulty, I
have warned you solemnly, as I thought _my_ duty."

"I will remember," said Clemence, laughing, "and in that event I shall
expect, and doubtless receive your warmest sympathy."

After that, she went to work with a will, and was so far successful in
her praiseworthy labors, that the home of the Owen's began to wear a
look hitherto a stranger to it. With her own hands, Clemence assisted in
establishing a new order of things, and when praised by the smiling Mr.
Owen, would triumphantly bring forward some work of his wife's, which
had been executed under her own supervision, as a proof that she had
been kept down, and was not so totally deficient in taste as had been
affirmed.

These little subterfuges, however, did not always have the desired
effect, and more than once Clemence was annoyed by an unmistakable
glance of admiration and a remark to the effect that after she left,
things would resume their former dilapidated appearance.

"What coarse manners this person has," she would think on these
occasions, "and how much his poor wife must suffer in his boorish
society."

She was pleased, though, and somewhat astonished, to see how readily