r mother.

The question of clothes, usually such a sorely insoluble problem for
academic people of small means, was solved by the Marshalls in an
eccentric, easy-going manner which was considered by the other faculty
families as nothing less than treasonable to their caste. Professor
Marshall, it is true, having to make a public appearance on the
campus every day, was generally, like every other professor,
undistinguishable from a commercial traveler. But Mrs. Marshall, who
often let a good many days pass without a trip to town, had adopted
early in her married life a sort of home uniform, which year after
year she wore in one form or another. It varied according to the
season, and according to the occasion on which she wore it, but it had
certain unchanging characteristics. It was always very plain as to
line, and simple as to cut, having a skirt neither full nor scant, a
waist crossed in front with a white fichu, and sleeves reaching just
below the elbow with white turn-back cuffs. As Mrs. Marshall, though
not at all pretty, was a tall, upright, powerfully built woman, with
a dark, shapely head gallantly poised on her shoulders, this garb,
whether short-skirted, of blue serge in the morning, or trailing, of
ruby-colored cashmere in the evening, was very becoming to her. But
there is no denying that it was always startlingly and outrageously
unfashionable. At a time when every woman and female child in the
United States had more cloth in her sleeves than in all the rest of
her dress, the rounded muscles of Mrs. Marshall's arm, showing through
the fabric of her sleeves, smote shockingly upon the eye of the
ordinary observer, trained to the American habit of sheep-like
uniformity of appearance. And at the time when the front of every
woman's waist fell far below her belt in a copiously blousing sag,
Mrs. Marshall's trim tautness had in it something horrifying. It must
be said for her that she did not go out of her way to inflict these
concussions upon the brains of spectators, since she always had in
her closet one evening dress and one street dress, sufficiently
approximating the prevailing style to pass unnoticed. These costumes
lasted long, and they took in the long run but little from the
Marshall exchequer: for she wore them seldom, only assuming what her
husband called, with a laugh, her "disguise" when going into town.

For a long time, until Sylvia's individuality began to assert itself,
the question of dress f