I did see, and to my mind its size bordered on indecency.  I like a box to look sufficiently large to take all I think a woman ought to need for a night’s stay.  Pauline often assures me it does hold everything, squashed tight, of course.  I say it must be squashed very tight, and she says it is.  “That’s the beauty of the present-day fashion of fluffy things:  everything is so easily squashed, and yet you can’t squash them; an accordion-pleated thing, for instance.”

To a man whose admiration for a woman is gauged by the amount of luggage she can travel without, Pauline would prove irresistible.  I know one who prides himself on his packing, and who has a horror of much luggage.  He was all packed ready to go to Scotland, when his wife asked him if he could lend her a collar-stud for her flannel shirts, and he said, “Yes, but you must carry it yourself, I’m full up!”

To that man Pauline, I am sure, would be very attractive.

When Pauline and I started off on our shopping expedition, she demurred at taking a hansom, although she loves driving in them; but she said ’buses were so much more amusing.  People in ’buses say such funny things,” she said, and so they do.  The old lady in particular who, when the horse got his leg over the trace without hurting himself or any one else, got up and announced to the ’bus in general:  “There, I always did say I hated horses and dogs,” and sat down again.  I loved her for that and for other things too, among them her apple-cheeks and poke bonnet.

Another reason why I insisted upon a hansom is that Pauline is not to be trusted in a ’bus; her interest in her fellow-creatures is embarrassing.  I have, moreover, sat opposite babies in ’buses with Pauline, and where a baby is concerned, she has no self-control.  So I was firm, and we started off in a hansom.  I was continually besought to look at some delicious baby, first this side, then that.

Pauline calmly avers that she would go mad if she lived in London.  She couldn’t stand seeing so many beautiful children, or babies, beautiful or otherwise.  It is curious how babies in perambulators hold out their hands to Pauline as she passes, and laugh and gurgle at her.

Once in Piccadilly, beautiful babies became less plentiful, and Pauline turned her thoughts and sympathies to horses and bearing-reins.  She was instantly plunged into the depths of despair.  Couldn’t I do something, she asked, to remedy such a crying evil?  She said it was the duty of every woman in London —­ Something in the catalogue she was carrying arrested her attention, and what it was the duty of every woman to do I am not sure.  I did not ask, but was grateful for the peace which ensued.

Pauline was glad the sales were on.  She loved them, and yet she didn’t like them, because she didn’t think they brought out the best side of a woman’s character.  “I think,” she said, “a woman’s behavior at sales is a test, don’t you?”