They donned their beautiful costumes with hearts fluttering in triumphant pride. But they had huddled into a corner of the ball-room in a panic of fright at the insane commotion their honest efforts to promote beauty had caused. One by one every woman in skirts save Barbara and Catherine left the room. The married ones seized their husbands and pushed them out ahead.
Norman, who was dancing with Barbara, broke down and burst into a paroxysm of laughter.
Some of the girls began to cry, but others made a brave effort to face the crowd of eager, giggling boys who pressed nearer.
The Bard approached with a serious look on his noble brow, deliberately put on his glasses and surveyed the crowd.
"My dear girls," he began, "I thank you from the bottom of my heart for the sincerity and honesty of your efforts to express beauty in unconventional form, but really this is beyond my wildest expectation."
Catherine drove the rude boys out of the room and closed the windows, while Barbara kissed the tears away from the hysterical innovators and led them back to their rooms.
The next morning the general assembly held an unusually solemn meeting at which it was voted by a large majority to settle at once and forever the question of dress by adopting a Socialist uniform of scarlet and white for the women, and for the men a dull gray suit with scarlet bands on the sleeve, a scarlet stripe and belt for the trousers.
The discussion was brief and Roland Adair, the Bard of Ramcat, protested in vain.