They both looked and saw a very quaint and dainty room, made pretty, moreover, not by money, but by taste and skill. Even the owner’s troubled countenance relaxed as she contemplated the effect of some yellow cushions she had recently added to an old chair that she had reclaimed from the shades of the attic, and had thus adorned. “Yes,” she assented reluctantly, “my room is rather satisfactory; but who is going to pay me for making oriental divans out of old piano-boxes, I’d like to know?” As Evelyn didn’t immediately order one, Nan went on, dejectedly dropping her chin into her palm. “But I should like to be artistic—even for money’s sake, you know. I want to have a studio, with queer bits of drapery that you don’t have to mend or hem. I’d like to be a decorative artist, and go into people’s houses and sweep out all the hideous steamboat furniture one sees. And I wish to know artists, and to have them come to my studio and eat sardines and crackers, and play Spanish airs on a banjo while I paint things to astonish the world. No, on second thought, I’d rather design, and if I could play the banjo myself while I thought up new ideas—wouldn’t that be lovely!” she shouted gleefully. She was quite cheerful now, with her little imaginary exploits. “Then an artist is what you are fitted to be, Nan, dear,” announced her sister with conviction; “for what any one wishes to be, that he _may_ be.” Nan received this scrap of philosophy with a shrug. “Yes, if he is a long-headed old fellow and wishes within his limits!” she said. “But I think some sort of artistic achievement is within your limits,” urged Evelyn. Nan bestowed a grateful look at her sister, but immediately voiced another objection: “Where am I going to begin? People are always talking about the ‘avenues now freely opened to our emancipated sisters,’ but no one ever tells a poor girl exactly how to begin—what to do first. Men have chances and opportunities.” “Yes,” Evelyn quickly rejoined; “and do you know how they happen to fill them? By being equal to their demands. If I were you, I should go to work and perfect some incomplete accomplishment. But I hear Mother calling. Come, cheer up, sister mine! ‘We miss the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt,’ you know.” This saying was a truth that had often been urged by Nan upon Evelyn’s own attention during seasons of self-abasement; so there was a touch of sarcasm in the elder sister’s smile, as she glanced back from the door. By that time, however, Nan’s nose was assuming its natural hue, and life began to look more hopeful, for she had a strong spirit that liked to conquer obstacles.