Of course the idle woman, the vain woman, the foolish woman in these times in England finds ample excuse for her folly and vast opportunity to indulge her folly in the social turmoil of the war. And she is going the pace. Her men are gone, who restrain her, and she has nothing in her head or her heart to hold, and she is in evidence. Her type always exaggerates its importance, and fools people into thinking that her name is Legion, and that Mr. Legion is an extensive polygamist, with a raft of daughters and sisters and cousins and aunts. But she is small in numbers and she is not important. She is merely conspicuous, and the moral break-down in England, that one hears of in the baited breath of the continent, is an illusion. The elevator girl at Bucklands Hotel in London was a bright, black-eyed, good looking woman in her late twenties. She wore a green uniform with a crimson voile boudoir cap and as the American stepped inside the slow-going car, she answered his "good morning" with a respectful, "good morning, sir." Being a good traveller, it seemed to me wise to prepare to while away the tedium of the long easy journey to the fourth floor with a friendly chat. "Any of your relatives in the war?" This from me by way of an ice-breaker. "Yes, sir, my husband, sir," she replied as she grasped the cable. She gave it a pull, and added "--or he was, sir. He's home now, sir!" "On leave?" "O no, sir, he's wounded, sir--he lost his left arm at the shoulder, sir, and he's going down to Roehampton today, sir, to see if they can teach him some kind of a trade there, sir," answered the woman. The wonders of Roehampton where they re-educate the cripples of war and turn them out equipped with such trades as their maimed bodies may acquire had been displayed for Henry and me the day before. "Tell him to try typewriting and stenography, one armed men are doing wonders with that down at Roehampton. Any children?" "Two, sir," she answered as the elevator approached the mezzanine floor, "three and five, sir!" "Three and five--well, well, isn't that fine! Aren't you lucky! Tell him to try that stenography; that will put him in an office and he'll have a fine chance to rise there. You must give them an education--a good one; send them to College. If they're going to get on in this new world they will need every ounce of education you can stuff into them. But it will be a splendid thing for both of you working for that. Is education expensive in England?" "Very, sir. I hardly see how we can do it, sir!" "That's too bad--now in our country education, from the primer to the university, is absolutely free. The state does the whole business and in my state they print the school books, and more than that they give a man a professional education, too, without tuition fees--if he wants to become a lawyer or a doctor or an engineer or a chemist or a school teacher!"