f general business-room. "I thought you
were going to set us women at work about something. Miss Morgan and I
have been waiting patiently."

"There was the cooking-school"--

"But we have nothing to cook. And how are we to get any thing? unless we
set up as those poor weavers in Toad Lane, on our pocket-money. I
believe I beg from those who have a little, nearly half my time, to give
to those who have nothing. And, would you believe it, some of the women
begin to think they _must_ be provided for. Mrs. Cairns asked me to-day
when the relief-store was going to open. She didn't see why there
shouldn't always be something here like the parish relief in England.
And when Mrs. Ray offered to take Josie this winter, and keep her in
shoes for what she could do, and teach her a little, Mrs. Cairns said,
'if she was worth any thing, she was worth more than that. She might
have her for a dollar a week.'"

"Such people ought to go hungry," declared Jane Morgan sharply.

"I've been thinking," said Jack, who now raised his eyes slowly, "there
is one thing you might help do; and, indirectly, it would be very
serviceable to me. Sylvie, you know Kit Connelly's corner, as they
always call it?"

"Well, so it is: Mrs. Connelly earned the money that bought it, and I am
glad she didn't let Dennis go on in business until he spent every cent
of it. And oh, Jack! all we women of Yerbury ought to be doubly proud
that she wouldn't let Den keep a beer-shop there, nor hire it to any one
else."

"I hope you are. I think Kit was pretty plucky to take the black eyes
and the grumbling. It was a good job for her when Den went over to the
Bowman House for hostler. So, of course, it has been shut up a year and
a half. You know, two blocks down below, Keppler's door stands open for
everybody, and so many of the mill-hands pass that way. It is so easy to
run in and get a glass, and the men who bring their lunches go down for
a mug of ale. It is a terrible temptation, and I wonder if they are not
more easily tempted on an empty stomach? Well, I've been considering for
some days if we could not start a coffee-house there,--set Kit up in
business. I'm not going to fling a temperance-pledge right in every
man's face,--for that makes them spiteful. I do not even want to exhort.
But if we put it there,--right in their way,--and there was a nice fire
in the evening, and maybe a book or two"--

"Splendid, Jack! There's no such thing in Yerbury. Let's get a