"Did you ever see a minister that could get the better of 'em?" said Mrs. Boddington. "'Cos, if you did, I would like to go and sit under his preachin' a spell, and see what he could do for me."
"Does that express the mind of Pleasant Valley generally?" asked the minister, and gravely this time.
"La! we ain't worse than other folks," said Mrs. Salter. "There's no harm in dressin' one's self smart now and then, is there? And we want to know how, to be sure."
"I hope you don't think Euphemie Knowlton knows how? 'Tain't a quarter as becomin' as the way we dress in Pleasant Valley. There ain't the least bit of prettiness or gracefulness in a woman's bein' three yards round; anyhow we don't think so when it's nature." So Mrs. Salter.
"What do you think o' lettin' your hair down over the shoulders, as if you were goin' to comb it?" said Mrs. Boddington; "and goin' to church so?"
"But how ever did she make it stand out as it did," asked Miss
Carpenter. "It was just like spun glass, nothin' smooth or quiet about
it. Such a yellow mop I never did see. And it warn't a child neither.
Who is she anyhow?"
"Not she. It is a grown woman," said Mrs. Flandin; "and she looked like a wild savage. Don't the minister agree with me, that it ain't becomin' for Christian women to do such things?"
It was with a smile and a sigh that the minister answered. "Where are you going to draw the line, Mrs. Flandin?"
"Well! with what's decent and comfortable."
"And pretty?"