What part did the love of humanity play in this young egoist's heart? She was living, as she had so well explained it, "not to save, but to give herself pleasure"; not to spare others, but to exercise her will in spite of them. Tenderness, reverence, gratitude, protection are the feelings which one generation awakens for another. Among the thousand contemporaries at Perry, from the sameness of their ambitions, there was inevitable rivalry and selfishness. The closer the age and capacity the keener the struggle. [Illustration: AFTER SATURDAY NIGHT'S SHOPPING] There are seven churches in Perry of seven different denominations. In this small town of 3,000 inhabitants there are seven different forms of worship. The church plays an important part in the social life of the mill hands. There are gatherings of all sorts from one Sunday to another, and on Sunday there are almost continuous services. There are frequent conversions. When the Presbyterian form fails they "try" the Baptist. There is no moral instruction; it is all purely religious; and they join one church or another more as they would a social club than an ordained religious organization. Friday was "social" night at the church. Sometimes there was a "poverty" social, when every one put on shabby clothes, and any one who wore a correct garment of any sort was fined for the benefit of the church. Pound socials were another variety of diversion, where all the attendants were weighed on arriving and charged a cent admission for every pound of avoirdupois. The most popular socials, however, were box socials, and it was to one of these I decided to go with two girls boarding in the house. Each of us packed a box with lunch as good as we could afford--eggs, sandwiches, cakes, pickles, oranges--and arrived with these, we proceeded to the vestry-room, where we found an improvised auctioneer's table and a pile of boxes like our own, which were marked and presently put up for sale. The youths of the party bid cautiously or recklessly, according as their inward conviction told them that the box was packed by friend or foe. My box, which, like the rest, had supper for two, was bid in by a tall, nice-looking mill hand, and we installed ourselves in a corner to eat and talk. He was full of reminiscence and had had a checkered career. His first experience had been at night work in a paper mill. He worked eleven hours a night one week, thirteen hours a night the next week, in and out of doors, drenched to the skin. He had lost twenty-five pounds in less than a year, and his face was a mere mask drawn over the irregular bones of the skull. "I always like whatever I am doing," he responded at my protestation of sympathy. "I think that's the only way to be. I never had much appetite at night. They packed me an elegant pail, but somehow all cold food didn't relish much. I never did like a pail.... How would you like to take a dead man's place?" he asked, looking at me grimly. I begged him to explain.