"How neatly it fits in. You have not been driven to arrange matters with the usual feminine etcetera."
"Because I have paid those etceteras myself."
"Really, but what were the etceteras? I thought they were always unknown quantities in ladies' accounts."
"That is one of the delusions of menkind. My etceteras were all the pennies paid for hampers coming and going, for labels, for scissors, three shillings those, without whose aid I could never have cut my way through the summer; they hold the flowers as you cut and save much backache. Then for sulphur, for quassia chips, for bast, for—"
"Hold! I will never ask what a woman's etcetera means again. I see it is much the most important part of the whole account. I wish they always paid it themselves. But why did you?"
"Oh, because, because five pounds is so little, you can have no idea how little, to buy everything with."
"Yes, but you started away with the idea it was a great deal."
"I said I could put some flowers in the garden with it anyway, and so I have. Even the Others allow that."
"Well, shall we say six pounds for this next year?"