"'Oh, no,' said she, 'not at all. I like the work very much, but, for various reasons, I shall not do any more of it.'
"I endeavored mildly to remonstrate against such a decision, but she shook her head. 'I was not a full sister at the time,' she said, 'and this was an experiment. I shall do no more of it.'
"Her manner was very decided, but I did not drop the subject. 'If you do not fancy writing from dictation,' I said, 'why don't you try typewriting? I should think that would be very interesting, and it could be done in your own room. The work would not require you to go out at all, if you object to that.' Now this was a slip, because she had not told me that she had gone out, but she did not notice it.
"'A sister does not have a room of her own,' she answered, 'and I do not understand typewriting;' and with that she left me, and went below, looking very meditative.
"But my remark had had an effect. I think it was not half an hour afterward when she came to me.
"'I have been thinking about your suggestion of typewriting,' she said. 'Is it difficult to learn? Do you understand it? What use could I make of a machine in the House of Martha?'
"I told her that I understood the art, and gave her all the information I could in regard to it, taking care to make the vocation as attractive as my conscience would allow. As to the use she could make of it, I said that at present there was a constant demand for typewritten copies of all sorts of writings,—legal, literary, scientific, everything.
"'And people would send me things,' she asked, 'and I would copy them on the typewriter, and send them back, and that would be all?'
"'You have put it exactly,' I said. 'If you do not choose, you need have no communication whatever with persons ordering the work.'
"'And do you know of any one who would want such work done?'