was as the voice of the Purity
Association, when she delivered an address, in the picturesque costume
she had abandoned, attacking measures contemplated by Government for the
protection of the health of the Army in India. This was reported in full
in the local paper, and Mr. Simpson sent a copy to Duff Lindsay, who
received it, I regret to say, with an unmistakable imprecation. But
Laura rejoiced. Deprived of her tambourine she nevertheless rejoiced
exceedingly.

CHAPTER XXV

The Mother Superior had a long upper lip, which she was in the habit
of drawing still further down; it gave her an air of great diplomatic
caution, almost of casuistry. Her face was pale and narrow; she had eyes
that desired to be very penetrating, and a flat little stooping figure
within her voluminous draperies. She carried about with her all
the virtues of a monastic order, patience was written upon her, and
repression, discipline, and the love of administration, written and
underlined, so that the Anglican Sister whom no Pope blessed was more
priestly in her personal effect than any Jesuit. It was difficult to
remember that she had begun as a woman; she was now a somewhat anaemic
formula making for righteousness. Sister Ann Frances, who in her turn
suggested the fat capons of an age of friars more indulgent to the
flesh, and whose speech was of the crispest in this world where there
was so much to do, thought poorly of the executive ability of the Mother
Superior, and resented the imposition, as it were, of the long upper
lip. Out of this arose the only irritations that vexed the energetic
flow of duty at the Baker Institution, slight official raspings which
the Mother Superior immediately laid before Heaven at great length. She
did it with publicity, too, kneeling on the chunam floor of the chapel
for an hour at a time obviously explaining matters. The bureaucracy of
the country was reflected in the Baker Institution; it seemed to Sister
Ann Frances that her superior officer took undue advantage of her
privilege of direct communication with the Supreme Authority, giving any
colour she liked to the incident. And when the Mother Superior's lumbago
came on in direct consequence of the cold chunam, the annoyance of
Sister Ann Frances was naturally not lessened.

There were twenty or thirty of them, with their little white caps tied
close under their chins, their long veils and their girdled black robes.
They were the most self-sacrificin