Mrs. Sniffen arrived presently. She seemed as starched, as rigid, as angular and prim as ever. But there was no disdainful tilt to her sharp nose. For the Mrs. Sniffen who now approached Eris was not the chilling automaton who had just admitted Annan’s dinner guests with priggish disapproval. Eris, shy of her, looked up at her in some apprehension. “Well,” exclaimed Mrs. Sniffen with a wintry smile, “you _did_ eat it all, didn’t you? That’s the way to grow ’ealthy _and_ wealthy, not to say wise, isn’t it, now? ’Ome vittles ’elps all ’urts, big or little, to my way of thinking.” “I enjoyed it so much, thank you,” murmured Eris. “And glad I am to ’ear you say it, Miss. ’Ave you quite finished?” “Yes, thank you very much.” Mrs. Sniffen took the tray, hesitated by the bedside: “I ’ope,” she said, “that you will soon be well, Miss.... New York is just as bad as London, every bit! I know them both, Missy; and they’re both uncommon nasty.” “I like New York,” said Eris, shyly. Mrs. Sniffen’s nose went up with a jerk. “And sorry I am to hear you say it,” she retorted severely. “Them that has nice clean ’omes in the nice clean countryside don’t realise their blessings, according to my way of thinking.” “Did you ever live in the country?” ventured Eris. “Turnham Green, Miss.” “Where is that?” “London. It was all dirt and gin and barracks when I was a kiddy. If I’d a pretty ’ome in the nice clean countryside like you, Miss, I’d be biding there yet, no doubt.” Eris shook her bobbed head: “I _had_ to come where I can have a chance to learn something.” “And what, may I ask, Miss, would you learn ’ereabouts?” inquired Mrs. Sniffen with elaborate irony. “There’s little to learn in New York that’s good for a body. It’s only a big, ’ot, dirty merry-go-round,--what with the outrageous noise and crowds and hurry and scurry, and wild capers and goings-on. No, Miss, you’ll learn nothing ’elpful ’ere, depend upon it!” Eris said, thoughtfully: “Only where are many people gathered is there the foundation for a real education.... Good and evil _are_.... Only truth matters. The important thing is to know.” “Who told you that?” demanded Mrs. Sniffen, amazed to hear such authoritative language. “Nobody. But I’m quite sure it’s so. Books alone do not educate. They are like roughage for cattle. There is no nourishment in them but they help to digest Truth. I wish to see and hear for myself, and learn to understand in my own way.... What _my_ eyes and ears tell me is what I ought to think about and try to understand. And I believe this is more important than reading in books what other people think of what _they_ have seen and heard.”