Save for Peggy and the eldest girl, who was a beauty, looks were not the chief asset of the family, so that for the doctor and the young architect it was more expedient that they should do well in the work they had taken up. Mrs Chadwick was on the whole very satisfied with the result of her effort on their behalf. Next to having girls of her own, four nieces with an average share of brains provided admirable material for the development of her feminist schemes. It afforded her immense gratification to watch their progress, and behold, instead of four helpless girls keeping house in bored inactivity on other people's money, four--or rather three--very capable young persons equal to fighting their own way through life, and privileged to enjoy the bread of independence. If any girl imagines there is a better lot in life she is mistaken. No occupation unfits a woman for the _role_ of wife and mother; it gives her rather a greater right to bring children into the world, when she is able to support them if necessary. Mr Musgrave would not have shared this opinion; but Musgravian ideas fill almshouses and orphanages and are responsible for a great deal of genteel and quite needless poverty. That one half--and that the larger half--of the race should depend for its existence on the other half is absurd. Peggy Annersley was a young woman of very independent spirit. Had she wished, she might have made her occupation as gardener at the Hall a sinecure. She could have given her orders to those under her and have enjoyed her leisure in any way that appeared agreeable to herself. Mrs Chadwick imposed no conditions or restraints. But Peggy drew a handsome wage, and she liked to fed when she received her monthly cheque that she had earned it; therefore she donned overalls and spoilt her hands, or, as she would have expressed it, hardened them, in the conscientious fulfilment of her duties. She put in her eight hours a day, except in the winter when work was slack, and insisted upon her half-day off during the week. There was only one matter in which she enjoyed any advantage over the rest--she was not liable to dismissal. On her half-day off Peggy usually went for a walk accompanied by Diogenes. She resolutely refused to give up these half-days to paying calls with her aunt or helping her to entertain visitors. If she were imperatively needed for social duties these had to be worked in in her employers' time. Peggy was a veritable Trades Union in herself, and refused absolutely to sacrifice her off-time to any object that did not conform with her ideas of pleasurable relaxation.