"Oh, mammy, mammy! what a mammy!" purred Elsie, her pretty upper lip curling in the smile her mother loved--with a reservation. Elsie had her father's sense of humor, and had caught his half-caressing way of indulging it at the "intense" little mother's expense. "Elsie," she observed, "you know _I_ don't mind your way of speaking to me,--as if I were the girl of sixteen and you the woman of forty,--but I hope you won't use it before the aunts and cousins. I shall be sure to lay myself open, but, dear, be careful. It isn't very good form to be too amused with one's mother. Of course there's as much difference in mothers as in girls," Mrs. Valentin acknowledged. "A certain sort of temperament interferes with the profit one ought to get out of one's experience. If you had my temperament I shouldn't waste this two years' experiment on you; I should know that nothing could change your--spots. But _you_ will learn--everything. How is your head, dear--what?" Elsie had said nothing; she had not had the opportunity. At a flag station where the train was halted (this overland train was a "local" as far as Sacramento) Mrs. Valentin looked out and saw a colored man in livery climb down from the back seat of a mail-cart and hasten across the platform with a huge paper box. It proved to be filled with magnificent roses, of which he was the bearer to the ladies opposite. A glance at a card was followed by gracious acknowledgments, and the footman retired beaming. He watched the train off, hat in hand, bowing to the ladies at their window as only a well-raised colored servant can bow. "The Coudert place lies over there," said Mrs. Valentin, pointing to a mass of dark trees toward which the trap was speeding. "They have been staying there," she whispered, "doing the west coast, I suppose, with invitations to all the swell houses." "Is your daughter not well?" the deep voice spoke across the car. As Elsie could not ride backward, her mother, to give her room, and for the pleasure of watching her, was seated with her own back to the engine, facing most of the ladies in the car. "She is a little train-sick; she could not eat this morning, and that always gives her a headache." Elsie raised her eyelashes in faint dissent. "She should eat something, surely. Have you tried malted milk? I have some of the lozenges; she can take one without raising her head." Search was made in a distinguished-looking bag, Mrs. Valentin protesting against the trouble, and beseeching Elsie with her eyes to accept one from the little silver box of pastils that was passed across the aisle. Elsie said she really could not--thanks very much. The keen, dark eyes surveyed her with the look of a general inspecting raw troops, and Mrs. Valentin felt as depressed as the company officer who has been "working up" the troops. "Won't you try one, Elsie?" she pleaded. "I'd rather not, mother," said Elsie.