Salemina and
       I were in Geneva.

    If you
        had ever
              travelled through Europe
                   with a charming spinster
         who never
            sat down
                   at a Continental table d'hote
         without being
              asked by an American vis-a-vis
         whether she
            were one of the P.'s

    of Salem,
           Massachusetts,
         you would understand
             why I call
                   my friend Salemina.

    She doesn't mind it.

    She knows
         that I am simply jealous
           because I
            came from
                   a vulgarly large tribe
             that never had any coat-of-arms,
           and whose ancestors always
             sealed their
            letters with their thumb nails.

    Whenever Francesca and
         I call her
           "Salemina,"
            she knows,
         and we know
             that she knows,
         that we
            are seeing a group
                   of noble ancestors
                 in a sort of halo
                   over her serene and
                  dignified head,
           so she remains
               unruffled under her petit nom,
         inasmuch as the casual public
            comprehends nothing
                   of its spurious origin
                and thinks it
            was given her
                   by her sponsors in baptism.

    Francesca,
           Salemina,
         and I
              have very different backgrounds.

    The first-named
        is an extremely pretty person
               of large income
         who is
              travelling with us simply
         because her relatives think
             that she will
         "see Europe"
            more advantageously
               under our chaperonage than
             if she
                were accompanied
                       by persons of her own
                     age or "set."

    Salemina is a philanthropist
           and educator
               of the first rank,
           and is
              collecting all sorts
                   of valuable material
                  to put
                       at the service
                           of her own country
             when she returns to it,
         which will not
              be a moment
             before her letter of credit
                is exhausted.

    I,
           too,
         am quasi-educational,
           for I
            had a
                   few years of experience
                 in mothering and
                  teaching little waifs and
                      strays of the streets
             before I
                began to paint pictures.

    Never shall
         I regret those nerve-racking,
           back-breaking,
         heart-warming,
           weary,
         and beautiful years,
           when,
         all unconsciously,
           I was
              learning to paint children
                   by living with them.

    Even now the spell
           still works and it
        is the curly head,
           the
         "shining morning face,"
            the ready tear,
         the glancing smile of childhood
             that enchains me
                and gives my brush
             whatever skill it possesses.

    We had not
        been especially high-minded
              or educational in Switzerland,
           Salemina and I. The worm
            will turn;
        and there is a point
             where the improvement
                   of one's mind
                seems a farce,
           and the service of humanity,
         for the moment,
           a duty
              only born
                   of a diseased imagination.

    How can one
          sit on a vine-embowered balcony
             facing lovely Lake Geneva
              and think about modern problems,
          --Improved Tenements,
           Child Labour,
         Single Tax,
           Sweat Shops,
         and the Right Training
               of the Rising Civilization?

    Blue Lake Geneva!

    --blue as a woman's eye,
           blue as the vault
               of heaven,
         dropped into the lap
               of the green earth
              like a great sparkling sapphire!

    Mont Blanc you know
          to be
              just behind the clouds
                   on the other side,
           and that presently,
         after hours
              or days of patient waiting,
           he may condescend
              to unveil himself
                   to your worshipful gaze.

    "He is wise
           in his dignity and reserve,"
        mused Salemina as
         we sat on the veranda.

    "He is
           all the more sublime
         because he
            withdraws himself
                   from time to time.

    In fact,
           if he didn't see
             fit to cover himself occasionally,
         one could neither
              eat nor sleep,
           nor do anything
             but adore and magnify."

    The day
         before this interview
             we had