Did you not really know that we who wear this saffron tunic are slaves,--a race apart, despised by all." "'Slaves,' no; how should I know it ?" "I thought you must understand a thing so fundamental, and it was that thought which made your questions seem unkind.

But if indeed you have come so far as not to understand even this, then let me tell you once we of this garb were women--priestesses of the immaculate conceptions of humanity; guardians of those great hopes and longings which die so easily.

And because we forgot our high station and took to aping another sex the gods deserted and men despised us, giving us, in the fierceness of their contempt, what we asked for.

We are the slave ants of the nest, the work-bees of the hive, come, in truth, of those here who still be men and women of a sort, but toilers only; unknown in love, unregretted in death--those who dangle all children but their own--slaves cursed with the accomplishment of their own ambition." There was no doubt poor An believed what she said, for her attitude was one of extreme dejection while she spoke, and to cheer her I laughed.
"Oh! come, it can't be as bad as that.

Surely sometimes some of you win back to womanhood?
You yourself do not look so far gone but what some deed of abnegation, some strong love if you could but conceive it would set you right again.