Hot blood crept up into my face until my cheeks burned and my ears tingled. Who was I, what had I accomplished, that gave me the right to turn up my nose at associating with a kitchen-maid? I slipped back into the seat beside Mary. What had I done? What was I doing to carry on the high resolves of this old Welshman and the rest of my hard-fighting, high-thinking ancestors? If I could not go to the front and fight to carry on the ideals of the country they had founded I could at least try to bring about an understanding of conditions at home—conditions caused by the ever-increasing struggle between human cooties and human drudges—a struggle which appears to me now as I write to threaten a greater disaster than that of the World War! Turning to the woman at my side, I asked: “Mary, didn’t you say that your cousin planned to give up her position as head chambermaid with a wealthy family in Pennsylvania?” “She give notice more’n three months ago,” my roommate assured me, eager to get me to talk. “If the housekeeper wasn’t so mortal hard to please Jennie’d be married and livin’ in her own home. The man she’s goin’ to marry owns his own farm and lives real well.” And Mary rambled off, giving a minute description of her cousin’s future husband and home. On our way back to the Belgrave after helping Mary compose a night-letter to her cousin I sent a telegram to Alice announcing that I would return the next day to New York. That evening on their return from work in the Sea Foam my fellow waitresses gave me a farewell entertainment. And it was a real entertainment, for several of the girls had good natural voices and an ear for music. It will be a long time before memories of “I’d Give My Crown for an Irish Stew,” as sung by laughter-loving Mollie, fades from my mind. One young waitress seemed to me as good a clog-dancer as I had seen on the stage. She had picked up the steps at a minstrel show—one attendance. What was still more surprising to me was that every one of them could do something in the way of playing the piano. Only one of them had ever taken lessons. Though I thoroughly enjoyed that evening I do not believe that in my whole life I ever felt so diffidently self-conscious. The realization of yourself as the only hypocrite among honest folk is not pleasant. These girls were all genuinely sorry for me, for my being discharged. Each one had contributed her mite to pay for the bunch of flowers presented to me at the end of the evening. I felt like a thief. The next morning when I applied at the hotel office for the wage due me, the paymaster gave me a receipt to sign. He had computed the amount at the rate of thirteen dollars a month. “According to my contract I was to be paid at the rate of sixteen dollars a month,” I reminded him, returning the paper unsigned. “You are not working in the side-hall,” he snapped back at me.