"If you'd give up the phosphates," she said, "and inquire into the way he was brought up, you might get more satisfaction. How he was drilled and drilled and made to read saints' lives, and told legends of the martyrs when he was going to bed, and made to believe that all that was nice and jolly in life was to be given up almost before you got it, and that all the sins in the decalogue were to be confessed, almost before you'd committed them; if you'd look into _this_, you might get a little light upon your subject." "Ah!" said Mrs. Smatter, interested, "perhaps that might account--" "Aunt Harriet," cried Missy, getting up, and letting her work fall on the floor--spools, thimble and scissors dispersing themselves in corners--"Aunt Harriet, there is a limit--" "A limit to what? Superstition and priest-craft--maudlin sentiment and enervating influence--" "Mamma, won't you go up stairs with me?" cried Missy, and there was no time given Mrs. Smatter for further speculation, or Miss Varian for further aggression. After the door closed behind them, Miss Varian's wrath rose against her inquisitive friend, and family feeling carried the day. "You'd better drop the subject of St. John, permanently," she said with decision. And Mrs. Smatter accommodatingly offered to read her a treatise on the Artistic Dualism of the Renaissance, with which the evening closed. CHAPTER XXII. A GARDEN PARTY. The summer had come to its end, to its very last day. Mrs. Hazard Smatter still lingered at Yellowcoats, notwithstanding the defective sanitary arrangements and the absence of stimulating mental contact. Miss Varian had felt considerable mortification that her friend should know she lived in such an atmosphere, and was always speaking of it apologetically and as temporarily stagnant. She had however given Mrs. Varian no rest till she had consented to see that it was her duty to provide some social entertainment for Mrs. Smatter, something, of course, inadequate to the mental needs of that lady, but something that would show her that she was still in the midst of civilized life. A lady who used familiarly the names that Mrs. Smatter did, could not of course be dazzled by the doctor or the rector. But she could be made to see that they had a good many young women who dressed well and several men who were good style. And there were two painters, and a stray architect or so, and a composer, staying in the place. These were not much, to make a show against the minds to which Mrs. Smatter was accustomed, but they were better than nothing. Therefore, Mrs. Varian must have at least two headaches, and Missy at least three days' work writing her invitations and getting up her garden party. Now, a garden party is a charming thing, when everything is favorable. All the neighborhood was delighted at the prospect, for invitations to garden parties were not rife in Yellowcoats, and the Varians' place was unusually nice for such a thing.