my look of disgust, "I would sooner any day hear something about my pretty eyes and my peach-like cheeks, than a graphic description of the Saharan desert, in a ball-room."
My best friend was leaving me alone and a feeling of desolation came over me. "Can't men talk with girls as they would with men?" I asked. "It seems to me that they must take us for very inferior beings. Men surely don't pay each other idiotic compliments, do they?"
Letty grew serious, and a faint blush deepened the "peach-like" color to which she had already referred. "What men say to one another," she remarked, "I am afraid our ears would hardly tolerate. When my brother Ralph was at home—before he went to China—we always used to have the house full of young fellows. I used frequently to come upon them, when they were laughing heartily, and evidently enjoying themselves. I wanted to laugh as well, but they invariably stopped when they saw me, as though I were a wet blanket. Once or twice I asked them to tell me what was amusing them. The youngest of the party blushed, while the oldest
