I SUPPOSE there has never been an earnest worker, an enthusiast on any subject, in this changeful world, but has been a victim at some time to the dismalness of a reaction. The most forlorn little victim that could be imagined was Flossy Shipley on that evening after the meetings, on which her soul had fed so long, were closed. Everything in nature and in circumstances conspired to sink her into her desolate mood. In the first place it was raining. Now a rain closing in upon a warm and dusty summer day is a positive delight; one can listen to the pattering drops with a sense of eager satisfaction but a rain in midwinter, after a day of sunless mist and fog, almost amounting to rain, when the streets are that mixture of snow and water that can be known only as "slush," when every opening of a door sends in gusts of damp air that chill to one's very bones, this weather is a trial; at least it seemed such to poor little Flossy. She shivered over the fire in the coal grate. It glowed brightly, and the room was warm and bright, yet to Flossy there was a sense of chill in everything. She was all alone; and the circumstances connected with that loneliness were not calculated to brighten the evening for her. The entire family had gone out to a party, not one of those quiet little entertainments which people had been so careful to explain and apologize for during the meetings, but a grand display of toilet and supper, and expenditure of all kinds. Mrs. Westervelt, the hostess, being at all times noted for the display of her entertainments, had lavished more than the usual amount of time and money on the present ones, and waited for the meetings to close with the most exemplary patience, in order that she might gain a very few among her guests from those who felt the impropriety of mixing things too much. To be sure, the society in general which was admitted to Mrs. Westervelt's parlors was not from that class who had any scruples as to what time they attended parties, but there were two or three notable exceptions, and those the lady had been anxious to claim. Prominent among them had been the Erskines, it never seeming to occur to Mrs. Westervelt's brains that there could be other excuse found for not accepting her invitation save the meetings that Ruth had taken to attending in such a frantic manner. Let me say, in passing, that neither Ruth Erskine nor her father honored the invitation; they had other matters to attend to. Meantime, Flossy Shipley, had utterly disgusted her mother, and almost offended her father, by giving a peremptory and persistent refusal. Such a storm of talk as there had been over this matter almost exhausted the strength of poor little Flossy, who did not like argument, and who yet could persist in a most unaccountable firm manner when occasion required.