“Well, maybe that is better than to be traitor to true love,” said Louisa, which did sound rather sentimental.
The next morning about eleven o'clock Mrs. Jameson came in, and we knew at once that she was, so to speak, fairly rampant in the field of improvement for our good, or rather the good of the village, for, as I said before, she was now resolved upon the welfare of the village at large, and not that of individuals or even societies.
“I consider that my own sphere has been widened this winter,” said Mrs. Jameson, and Louisa and I regarded her with something like terror. Flora Clark said, when she heard that remark of Mrs. Jameson's, that she felt, for her part, as if a kicking horse had got out of the pasture, and there was no knowing where he would stop.
We supposed that it must be an evidence of Mrs. Jameson's own advance in improvement that she had adopted such a singular costume, according to our ideas. She was dressed no longer in the rich fabrics which had always aroused our admiration, but, instead, wore a gown of brown cloth cut short enough to expose her ankles, which were, however, covered with brown gaiters made of cloth like her dress. She wore a shirt-waist of brown silk, and a little cutaway jacket. Mrs. Jameson looked as if she were attired for riding the wheel, but that was a form of exercise to which she was by no means partial either for herself or for her daughters. I could never understand just why she was not partial to wheeling. Wheels were not as fashionable then as now, but Mrs. Jameson was always quite up with, if not in advance of, her age.
Neither of us admired her in this costume. Mrs. Jameson was very stout, and the short skirt was not, to our way of thinking, becoming.
“Don't you think that I have adopted a very sensible and becoming dress for country wear?” said she, and Louisa and I did not know what to say. We did not wish to be untruthful and we disliked to be impolite. Finally, Louisa said faintly that she thought it must be very convenient for wear in muddy weather, and I echoed her.
“Of course, you don't have to hold it up at all,” said I.
“It is the only costume for wear in the country,” said Mrs. Jameson, “and I hope to have all the women in Linnville wearing it before the summer is over.”
Louisa and I glanced at each other in dismay. I think that we both had mental pictures of some of the women whom we knew in that costume. Some of our good, motherly, village faces, with their expressions of homely dignity and Christian decorousness, looking at us from under that jaunty English walking-hat, in lieu of their sober bonnets, presented themselves to our imaginations, and filled us with amusement and consternation.
“Only think how Mrs. Sim White would look,” Louisa said after Mrs. Jameson had gone, and we both saw Mrs. White going down the street in that costume indicative of youthful tramps over long stretches of road, and mad spins on wheels, instead of her nice, softly falling black cashmere skirts covering decently her snowy stockings and her cloth congress boots; and we shuddered.