Eileen didn’t exactly suffer from rags. She was as neat and patched and wholesome as her clean, sensible grandmother could make her; but she was forlorn-looking to the last degree. One of the first things I tried to do was to get her to take a little pride in her personal appearance. And it was wonderful how she responded. With her hair released from the uncompromising, tight screw that had been kept in place by three big iron-looking hair-pins, and done higher up, and more loosely over the forehead, and a pretty collar and blue bow for her Sunday blouse, she looked a different being. “Poor little thing, she has never had a soul take any interest in how she looks,” Ursula remarked to me. “And even though we’re not allowed to cast our bread upon the waters, nowadays, they haven’t said anything officially about ribbons.” And so we searched our drawers for suitable finery that might bring a little colour into Eileen’s hitherto drab outlook. Virginia followed suit, remarking that she liked to scatter little seeds of kindness by the wayside, since you never know what may result. True! She didn’t! Meanwhile, Eileen gloated over the odds and ends, fixing weird and crazy-looking bows to her black sailor hat, draping her shoulders with bits of lace to see if they would make a collar, and standing in front of the kitchen glass trying the effect of pinks and purples under her chin. For a time, the questions ceased. VIII A Cold Snap FOR a couple of days the sun was radiant, and the air actually warm. We agreed with each other that Italy and the South of France weren’t in it. We started gardening with all the zest of backwoods-women, who know that the only vegetables they can hope for are those they themselves grow. Unlike the majority of Londoners, the War had not added much to our knowledge in this direction. I had not owned a house in the country many months before I learnt the value of first-hand home production. Hence, when the allotment fever set in, we were quite able to keep pace with the rest of the world despite our failing intellects. The only thing that differentiated us from the remainder of our fellow-citizens in the Metropolis, was the fact that we appeared to be the only ones who did not feel themselves competent to bestow unlimited information and advice, in season and out of season, to all and sundry, on every imaginable and unimaginable point connected with the raising of food crops. One of the many reasons for the charm that envelops our life at the hillside cottage lies in the fact that it brings us much closer to the fundamental principle of keeping alive than is ever possible in town with its over-civilization. Of course, it isn’t desirable that our mental and spiritual interests should centre in the question of what we shall eat and what we shall drink, and wherewithal shall we keep warm and comfortable, but I think a woman suffers a distinct loss when she eliminates these matters entirely from her horizon.