Mrs. Brander has been continuing her inspection tours, travelling from one place to another to examine the girls’ schools. She went lately from a town called Salem, which she reached by railway, to a small place thirty-one miles distant—Atur. The road is so frequented by thieves that she was advised to engage drivers for her procession of carts belonging to the caste of those very thieves, so as to ensure not being attacked. This was done, and they proved “most polite and excellent drivers.” The school at Atur contained only forty children; but Mrs. Brander felt that she did good by visiting it. The prizes that she had brought were distributed, and the little girls were delighted to receive them. An important native gentleman of the place who came to the ceremony made a good speech in the Tamil language, and altogether Mrs. Brander’s arrival was felt to be an encouraging incident in the life of that far-off place. I shall be glad after a while to tell your readers how their kind presents were used; and I may add that I shall still be grateful for more. E. A. MANNING. 35, Blomfield-road, Maida-hill, January 18. DRESS: IN SEASON AND IN REASON. BY A LADY DRESSMAKER. [Illustration: ON THE MEER.] Just at the present writing we are in the middle of the sales, which now seem to be carried on far into the month of February, at many of the shops, and certainly appear to offer each year more and more benefits to the purchaser of goods. But it must be understood that the said purchaser have her wits about her, and know what she wants. This last is the case with very few women who are not very methodical in their purchases of dress, and very rarely make their plans far ahead. This is explained, first, by their slavish adherence to the ephemeral fashions of the day, and also by their being led so much by the eye, and buying things they fancy, not the things that are really suitable or needful to them. There are few women who dress on any plan of what is most becoming to their individual style, or most lasting, with a view to their particular purses; and the longer I live the more convinced I am that it needs special qualifications to be a “shopper” of any ability; the greatest requisite of all being a cool, calm head; and, if you have children to cater for besides yourself, the power to make a plan and stick to it. It is wonderful how much you find to help you when you once do this, or how easily everything arranges itself.