Another kind of popular person is the woman whose sympathies are more superficial, but whose faculties are more brilliant; the woman who makes herself agreeable, as it is called--that is, who can talk when she is wanted to talk; listen when she is wanted to listen; take a prominent part and some responsibility or keep her personality in the background, according to circumstances and the need of the moment; who is eminently a useful member of society, and popular just in proportion to the pleasure she can shed around her. But she offends no one, even though she is notoriously sought after and made much of; for she is good-natured to all, and people are not jealous of those who do not flaunt their successes and whom popularity does not make insolent. The popular woman of this kind is always ready to help in the pleasure of others. She is a fair-weather friend, and shrinks with the most charming frankness from those on whom dark days have fallen. She is really very sorry when any of her friends fall out from the ranks, and are left behind to the tender mercies of those cruel camp-followers in the march of life--sorrow or sickness; but she feels that her place is not with them--rather with the singers and players who are stepping along in front making things pleasant for the main body. But if she cannot stop to smooth the pillows of a dying-bed, nor soothe the troubles of an aching heart, she can organize delightful parties; set young people to congenial games; take off bores on to her own shoulders, and even utilize them for the neutralization of other bores. She is good for the back seat or the front, as is most convenient to others. She can shine at the state-dinner where you want a serviceable show, or make a diversion in the quiet, not to say stupid, conglomerate of fogies, where you want a lively element to prevent universal stupor. She talks easily and well, and even brilliantly when on her mettle, but not so as to excite men's envy; and she has no decided opinions. She is a chameleon, an opal, changing ever in changing lights, and no one was yet able to determine her central quality. All that can be said of her is that she is good-natured and amusing, clever, facile, and ever ready to assist at all kinds of gatherings, which she has the knack of making go, and which would have been slow without her; that she knows every game ever invented, and is good for every sort of festivity; that she is always well-dressed, even-tempered, and in (apparently) unwearied spirits and superb health; but what she is at home, when the world is shut out, never troubles the thoughts of any. She is to society what the sympathetic woman is to the individual, and the reward is much the same in both cases. But unless the socially useful woman has been able to secure the interest of the sympathetic one, the chances are that, popular as she is now, she will be relegated to the side when her time of brilliancy has passed; and that, when her last hour comes, it will