CHAPTER XXVII.
Approaching the Reality.
The summer was slipping away, and, in spite of wars and rumours of wars, London was emptying fast—we know that London gets empty at the end of the summer, just as the bed of the Atlantic does in dry weather. Mr Bristley’s exchange of duty was up; and indeed Lesbia was not sorry at the prospect of getting away from town, where her health had slightly suffered from the close atmosphere, to which she was unaccustomed, and where fewer opportunities than she had looked for had offered for exerting her reforming influence over other young girls. Certainly her intimacy with Lady Friga Hawknorbuzzard had given her the entrée to refined society, and she had made the most of it. Her perseverance in dressing more rationally than those with whom she associated had begun to crack the wall of prevailing fashion among them, not only in the matter of costume itself, but, as a natural consequence, in the many habits with which fashion in dress is associated. Not a few women who at first made fun of her, had begun to envy her vigorous independence of character, and even to think of casting off some of their own fetters. Among the many un-young-ladylike things she did, her bicycling was, on the whole, that which attracted most attention when the sex of the rider was noticed, as, astride of a nickled fifty-two, she careered along the wood pavement of the principal thorough-
