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nine o’clock that morning. By eleven o’clock their excitement had cooled a little. Quite a number of passers-by had stopped to look in at the window, where six of the prettiest hats, and a big bowl of roses, were arranged against a background of carelessly draped jade green satin, and short black velvet curtains. But no one came in. And when Ann heard two women exclaim: “Aren’t those roses perfectly lovely!” she began to wonder for the first time if she had been unduly optimistic. By twelve, however, she had sold her first hat—one of her most expensive models—to a fat old Maori woman in a bright red and blue checked cotton dress. In spite of her disappointment Ann couldn’t help laughing. She could imagine nothing more incongruous than the dainty, lace-trimmed straw, perched upon that untidy black head, from which a man’s felt hat had been removed. Ann had firmly declined to allow her first customer to “try on” anything. The old Maori nodded good-naturedly: pointed to the pink hat, said: “I have him. How much?” produced three pound notes and three shillings, paid for the hat, put it on her head, and walked out carrying the battered felt-which she had refused to allow Ann to wrap up—in her hand.

“Perhaps that means luck,” said Mrs. Hill. “Like a black cat.”

“But she wasn’t black, ” objected Ann. “Only brown.”

“She was as near as no-matter black,” said Mrs. Hill.

Neither she nor Ann was wasting time. They were both stitching imdustriously at straw and ribbon. Later in the afternoon Mrs. Hill declared that