'When have you been on Jeannie before?' Rollo asked, when they had got quit of the Chickaree woods and were indulging in a good trot along the level country road. 'Not since the end of last November,—the day before I went to town.' 'My little Wych!' said Rollo, riding close up alongside,—'what sort of a year has this been?' 'Very mixed up. Part of the winter was pleasant.' 'The summer?—' 'I suppose that was pleasant too—only I did not enjoy it.' 'Why didn't you come home?' 'The old story,' she said laughing and colouring,—'I did not want to come. Mr. Falkirk thinks I never have any other reason to give.' 'Might be a very good reason to give Mr. Falkirk. Now, do you know what you are going to look at?' 'Mill people and mill work.' 'In detail; but in general you are going to see what my friend Mrs. Powder calls "my experiment." A problem of life-work, if you will; the question being, what can be done with fifteen hundred human beings accustomed only to poverty and hard work, to bring them to their nearest attainment of happy and useful living.' 'Fifteen hundred unhappy people!'—Hazel repeated. 'I should think everybody would be trying experiments.' 'You rode through the place once. You remember how they looked. Tell me what you would have tried first?' 'I remember. But I hardly knew what it meant, then.' There was a little emphasis upon the last word. 'Go on, and say what would occur to you to do.' 'Ah, you will only laugh and call me unpractical,' said Hazel smiling; 'but the first thing _I_ should do, Mr. Rollo, would be to beautify the places where they live. I believe it does people good to be—just a little—smothered in roses.' 'I believe in roses; but they were not the first thing I set about. For two reasons; they take time, and also they have to be in a certain degree prepared for. The old dwellings could not be beautified; I had to build new ones; but also, Hazel, and this is a more important thing, the desire for something better than the people knew, had to be excited. Roses are not a substitute for bread,—to the uncultured mind,' he added smiling; 'and men that are ground in the dust of poverty need first of all to get ambition enough to raise their heads and wash their faces. The _very_ first thing I did, was to make the pay sufficient for decent living. That gave them from the beginning some confidence in me, too.' 'Yes, of course. O that, I knew, you had done. I heard of it last winter.'