She did not see the need of women having a society by themselves either.  Probably they raised just as much money before the ladies got to making such a fuss about it, it all came out of their husband’s pockets anyway.  Her husband always had contributed to Foreign Missions, and always would probably (it’s true he did, a dollar a year!) and was not that just as well as for her to be bothering her head about it?

“There!” said Mrs. Williams, one bright afternoon in April, as she glanced from her window.  “There comes that Mrs. Brown.  I know what she’s after.  She wants me to go to that stupid missionary meeting.  I suppose this is the afternoon for it.  I promised her I would go again some time—­sorry I did too.  That’s just as much sense as some persons have; think that one can drop everything and go to a missionary meeting—­in the spring of the year, too, when there is so much sewing to be done;” and she hastily instructed Bridget to tell Mrs. Brown that she was “engaged.”  So Mrs. Brown went on her way to the meeting, and sat in heavenly places, and had her heart stirred with new love and zeal, while Mrs. Williams sat at home, and worked diligently on a dress for her young daughter, an elaborate dress of frills, and lace, and embroidery, and many weary stitches.  At the close of the day she congratulated herself that she had accomplished a fine afternoon’s work.

There were whole seas of sewing to be waded through, Mrs. Williams said, before she could have any spare afternoons.  There was the dressmaking, all her own dresses to be remodelled after the present style, besides new ones (when Mrs. Williams had a dressmaker in the house—­to use her own words—­she “almost worked herself to death”) then there was all the other sewing.  It really was appalling to think of the amount of ruffling and tucking and side-pleating and puffing that must be gone through, before the summer wardrobes of herself and her little daughters would be completed.  There was the house-cleaning, the smallest detail of which required her personal supervision, for Mrs. Williams was elaborate throughout; all her housekeeping was squared up to certain fine lines.  If she ever had a morsel of time from these things, stern necessity compelled her to spend it in fancy work; for tidies, and soft pillows, and bracket-covers, and stand-covers, and mats were indispensable.  When Mrs. Williams was asked to subscribe for “Woman’s Work for Woman,” she assured them that she knew already all about woman’s work that she desired to.

It was done at last—­the spring sewing and the house cleaning, and the summer heats had come.  The day was warm, and Mrs. Williams, in a cool white wrapper, had established herself on the parlour sofa with a book.  She had neglected to tell Bridget that she was not at home, and just as she was in the most absorbing part of one of George Eliot’s absorbing novels, a caller was ushered in.  “Mrs. Brown! that missionary woman again!  Was ever