‘It is a pity,’ said Mr. Goacher, smiling, ‘that animals will not suit our requirements. But to be practical, Miss Toller might be instructed to order legs of mutton with more fat. This reminds me of beef, and beef reminds me of Christmas. It is now the second Sunday in Advent, and there is a subject which you will remember we had agreed to discuss this week.’ This important subject was a proposal by Mrs. Mudge that Miss Toller should dine with them on Christmas Day. ‘You, Mrs. Poulter,’ said Mr. Goacher, ‘are of opinion that we should not invite her?’ ‘Certainly. I do not see how she is to send up the dinner properly if she is to be our guest, and I imagine also she would not be comfortable with us.’ _Mrs. M._ ‘Why shouldn’t she be comfortable? Of course, if we don’t try to make her so she won’t be. There are ways to make people comfortable and ways to make them uncomfortable. Miss Toller is just as good as any of us.’ _Miss T._ ‘She is not an educated woman, and I am sure she would rather remain downstairs; our conversation would not interest her.’ _Miss E._ ‘Pray, Miss Taggart, what is an educated woman?’ _Miss T._ ‘What a question, Miss Everard! By an educated woman is meant a woman who has been taught the usual curriculum of a lady in cultivated circles.’ _Miss E._ ‘What is the curriculum of a cultivated lady?’ _Miss T._ ‘Really you are provoking; you understand perfectly as well as I do.’ _Miss E._ ‘I am still in the dark. What is the curriculum of a cultivated lady?’ _Mrs. P._ ‘I much doubt if Miss Toller is acquainted with the ordinary facts of geography, even those which are familiar to common seamen in the Navy. She probably could not tell us the situation of the Straits of Panama.’ Mrs. Poulter had been reading something in the newspaper the day before about the Panama Canal. _Miss E._ ‘Straits of Panama!’ but she checked herself when she saw that not a muscle moved on anybody’s face. ‘Now, my dear Mrs. Poulter, I assure you I have friends who dine in the best society, and I’ll be bound they never heard of the Straits of Panama.’ _Mrs. P._ ‘The society in which _I_ was accustomed to mix, Miss Everard, would have excluded a person who was so grossly ignorant.’ _Miss T._ ‘The possession of scientific truth, in addition to conferring social advantages, adds so much to our happiness.’ _Miss E._ ‘This also I am inclined to dispute. Do you really feel happier, Mrs. Poulter, because you can tell us what continents are divided by the Straits of Panama?’ _Mrs. M._ ‘I’ll lay a wager Miss Toller knows as much as we do, but the things she knows aren’t the things we know.’ _Mr. G._ ‘We are digressing, I am afraid. I suggest we should have a ballot. I will write “Yes” on five little pieces of paper, and “No” on five, and after distribution we will fold them up, and each of us shall drop one in the vase on the mantel-shelf.’ This was done, and there were three for the invitation and two against it.