I went into the room and looked around. It was full of women, wonderfully dressed women, all in low necks and short sleeves, and white shoes--laughing, giggling women, who looked over each others naked shoulders into a great broad looking-glass crowded full of faces that couldn't seem to admire themselves enough. I stopped at the door. I scarcely breathed. What could all those rosy-cheeked, bare-armed ladies be doing in that house? I asked this question, of course, of Cousin Dempster, who came into the hall a-pulling his white gloves on. "Dempster," says I, in a low voice, "what does this mean? Where are the ministers?" "Oh, they are in the back room. You didn't expect them to be turned in with the ladies, did you?" "Well," says I, "it is customary in our State now, though it was not formerly, when the men sat on one side at prayer-meetings, and the girls on the other, but I didn't think that notion had got to foreign parts." I don't think Dempster heard me clearly, for that minute his wife came out of the room, blazing like the whole milky-way of stars. "Why, Phœmie," says she, a-holding up both the white kid gloves she had just buttoned on, "you don't mean to go down with that bonnet on?" "I should think you would be ashamed to go into a conference or a prayer-meeting with it off," says I, severely. E. E. stared at Dempster, and he stared at her. Then he hitched up his shoulders, and she gave her hands a little toss in the air. I didn't seem to notice their antics, but went with them downstairs, where I heard the sound of music, which didn't strike me as so sacred as it ought to be. Besides, there was a buzz and a hum like a hive of bees swarming, which was puzzling. When we went into the great, long room, that seemed running over with light, the crowded state of the congregation astonished me. There wasn't seats enough for one quarter of the worshippers. Sisters, I was the only one present who had studied the sacred decencies of a bonnet and shawl. The rest were dressed--well, they weren't dressed at all about the arms and shoulders, which shocked me dreadfully; the mere presence of a lot of ministers ought to have made women more decorous. Would you believe it, the people round the doors stared at me as if they had never seen a beehive bonnet, with feathers floating over it, before. Some people might have felt shocked at so many eyes turned on them, but I was in the straight and narrow path of duty, and their looks passed by me like the idle wind. If they didn't understand the solemnity of the occasion, I did. "There is the Minister," says Dempster, "let us pay our respects." "Why," says I, "there don't seem to be either a reading desk or pulpit here!" I don't think Dempster heard me, for he began to edge our way through the crowd, till we got clear into the room, which was so full of flowers and lights and music that I began to think the foreign ministers were keeping up Easter-Sunday yet.