something of gratitude as well, on the men she has escaped from. Life does not run only in one channel for the American Woman. She does not “make tracks” solely from the cradle to the altar, from the altar to the grave. She realizes that there is more fun to be got out of being born than just this little old measure meted out to her by the barbaric males of earliest barbaric periods, when women were yoked to the plough with cattle. And it is the innate consciousness of her own power and intelligent ability that gives her the dominating charm,--the magnetic spell under which the stolid Britisher falls more or less stricken, stupefied and inert. He is never a great talker; she is. Her flow of conversation bewilders him. She knows so much too--she chatters of Shakespeare, Byron, Shelley, Keats--and he thinks he has heard of these people somewhere before. He listens dumbly. Sometimes he scratches his head,--occasionally he feels his moustache, if he has one. When she laughs, he smiles slowly and dubiously. He hopes she is not laughing at _him_. He feels--he feels--dontcherknow--that she is “ripping.” He couldn’t tell you what he means by “ripping” to save his life. But painfully accustomed as he is to the dull and listless conversation of the British materfamilias, and to the half-hoydenish conduct of the British tom-boy girl who _will_ insist on playing golf and hockey with him in order not to lose him out of her sight, he is altogether refreshed and relieved when the American Woman dawns upon his cloudy horizon, and instead of waiting upon _him_, commands him to wait upon _her_, with one dazzling look of her bright, audacious eye. The American Woman is not such a fool as to go play hockey with him at all times and in all weathers, thereby allowing him to take the unchecked measure of her ankles. She is too clever to do anything that might possibly show her in an unlovely or ungraceful light. She takes care to keep her hands soft and small and white, that they may be duly caressable,--and makes the best and prettiest of herself on all and every occasion. And that she has succeeded in taking English society by storm is no matter of surprise. English society, unmixed with any foreign element, is frequently said to be the dullest in the world. It is an entertainment where no one is entertained. A civil apathy wraps each man and woman in its fibrous husk, and sets them separately apart behind barricades of the most idiotic conventionality. The American Woman is the only being that can break down these barricades and tear the husk to shreds. No wonder she is popular! The secret of her success is in her own personal charm and vivacious intelligence,--in her light scorn of stupid ceremonies,--in the frank geniality of her disposition (when she can manage to keep it unspoilt by contact with the reserved hypocrisy of the “Smart Set,”) and the delightful spontaneity of her thoughts which find such ready expression in equally spontaneous speech.