ted
over the facts as they are?"

"Because the actual people are dirty and disagreeable and it's too
much bother, I suppose," replied Rose carelessly. "Felicia, you can
never reform the world. What's the use? We're not to blame for the
poverty and misery. There have always been rich and poor; and there
always will be. We ought to be thankful we're rich."

"Suppose Christ had gone on that principle," replied Felicia, with
unusual persistence. "Do you remember Dr. Bruce's sermon on that
verse a few Sundays ago: 'For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ, that though he was rich yet for our sakes he became poor,
that ye through his poverty might become rich'?"

"I remember it well enough," said Rose with some petulance, "and
didn't Dr. Bruce go on to say that there is no blame attached to
people who have wealth if they are kind and give to the needs of the
poor? And I am sure that he himself is pretty comfortably settled.
He never gives up his luxuries just because some people go hungry.
What good would it do if he did? I tell you, Felicia, there will
always be poor and rich in spite of all we can do. Ever since Rachel
Winslow has written about those queer doings in Raymond you have
upset the whole family. People can't live at that concert pitch all
the time. You see if Rachel doesn't give it up soon. It's a great
pity she doesn't come to Chicago and sing in the Auditorium
concerts. She has received an offer. I'm going to write and urge her
to come. I'm just dying to hear her sing."

Felicia looked out of the window and was silent. The carriage rolled
on past two blocks of magnificent private residences and turned into
a wide driveway under a covered passage, and the sisters hurried
into the house. It was an elegant mansion of gray stone furnished
like a palace, every corner of it warm with the luxury of paintings,
sculpture, art and modern refinement.

The owner of it all, Mr. Charles R. Sterling, stood before an open
grate fire smoking a cigar. He had made his money in grain
speculation and railroad ventures, and was reputed to be worth
something over two millions. His wife was a sister of Mrs. Winslow
of Raymond. She had been an invalid for several years. The two
girls, Rose and Felicia, were the only children. Rose was twenty-one
years old, fair, vivacious, educated in a fashionable college, just
entering society and already somewhat cynical and indifferent. A
very hard young lady to please, her father said