Lucia burst out laughing.

'Aye, and she will like feeling and examining them too, won't she, Martha?'

'In course she will, the darling! But look at the pretty innocent! She don't know from Adam what we are talking about!'

'Well, I don't,' said I, 'and what is more I don't want to. I detest the idea of lovers and should never have thought of such a creature, but for Lucia's chat.'

Ah, well, dearie!' said Martha. 'Believe me, woman's comfort and blessing lies in a man, and just as a man ain't perfect without his woman, so is a woman wanting until she has her man, to fit like into her.'

Lucia clapped her hands.

'That is it exactly,' she cried, 'just like one of your beloved flowers, Susan, when the male part fits exactly into the female.'

'I don't understand you,' said I, bewildered. 'How can a man fit into me?'

'Oh,' said Martha. 'Miss Lucia can tell you, Miss Susan dear, and most girls of your age would know it too, without going to bed with a man.'

'The idea!' cried I.

'Well, when you are married, won't you have your husband in bed with you?' said Martha, laughing.

'I'll never be married!'

'Fiddle-sticks!' cried Martha. 'It would be a sin for you not to be married. You'll never know pleasure without, and I can tell ye, young ladies,' said she, sinking her voice to a whisper, 'that until a girl marries a man she don't know what pleasure means. I've known girls, young ladies, quite afeared the day of the first night they were going to sleep with their husbands, frightened to go to bed, thinking something dreadful was going to happen, and next morning die of laughing at their odd fears, and long for night to come, so as they might have some more fun.'

Old Penwick's bell rang and put a stop to Martha's chat, and I turned to Lucia and said, 'Really, Lucia, you must tell me all about men and wives, and teach me, because I feel like a fool when you and Martha go on so. I don't understand one atom, though perhaps,' I continued, as a bright thought struck me, 'men tickle their wives as you tickled me this afternoon, and that is what Martha meant?'