“I supposed,” continued Miss Cotton, “that it was only among the poor in the cities, who have begin misled by agitators, that the-well-to-do classes were regarded with suspicion.”

“It seems to have begun a great while ago,” said Mrs. Brinkley, “and not exactly with agitators.  It was considered very difficult for us to get into the kingdom of heaven, you know.”

“Yes, I know,” assented Miss Cotton.

“And there certainly are some things against us.  Even when the chance was given us to sell all we had and give it to the poor, we couldn’t bring our minds to it, and went away exceeding sorrowful.”

“I wonder,” said Miss Cotton, “whether those things were ever intended to be taken literally?”

“Let’s hope not,” said John Munt, seeing his chance to make a laugh.

Mrs. Stamwell said, “Well, I shall take another cup of coffee, at any rate,” and her hardihood raised another laugh.

“That always seems to me the most pitiful thing in the whole Bible,” said Alice, from her place.  “To see the right so clearly, and not to be strong enough to do it.”

“My dear, it happens every day,” said Mrs. Brinkley.

“I always felt sorry for that poor fellow, too,” said Mavering.  “He seemed to be a good fellow, and it was pretty hard lines for him.”

Alice looked round at him with deepening gravity.

“Confound those fellows!” said the photographer, glancing at his hastily developed plate.  “They moved.”

XVII.

The picnic party gathered itself up after the lunch, and while some of the men, emulous of Mavering’s public spirit, helped some of the ladies to pack the dishes and baskets away under the wagon seats, others threw a corked bottle into the water, and threw stones at it.  A few of the ladies joined them, but nobody hit the bottle, which was finally left bobbing about on the tide.

Mrs. Brinkley addressed the defeated group, of whom her husband was one, as they came up the beach toward the wagons.  “Do you think that display was calculated to inspire the lower middle classes with respectful envy?”

Her husband made himself spokesman for the rest:  “No; but you can’t tell how they’d have felt if we’d hit it.”

They all now climbed to a higher level, grassy and smooth, on the bluff, from which there was a particular view; and Mavering came, carrying the wraps of Mrs. Pasmer and Alice, with which he associated his overcoat.  A book fell out of one of the pockets when he threw it down.

Miss Anderson picked the volume up.  “Browning!  He reads Browning!  Superior young man!”

“Oh, don’t say that!” pleaded Mavering.

“Oh, read something aloud!” cried another of the young ladies.

“Isn’t Browning rather serious for a picnic?” he asked, with a glance at Alice; he still had a doubt of the effect of the rheumatic uncle’s dance upon her, and would have been glad to give her some other aesthetic impression of him.