TWO DIANAS IN ALASKA 5 



goods way," but I strongly advocated the claims of a 

 persistent "drummer." A musical husband is such 

 an acquisition. I did not know until later that 

 "drummer" is merely Americanese for a common 

 or garden commercial traveller. Miss Mamie could 

 not make up her mind. It did seem hard that one 

 woman should have such a glut of would-be hus- 

 bands, while we two were with not even one husband 

 in sight. 



" Husbands ain't come by easy," said Miss Mamie 

 sententiously. " What you two gals need to do is 

 to go out and scratch for 'em." 



How energetically she must have scratched ! Such 

 a list came up every minute. And Miss Mamie was 

 quite old, older than we were, quite thirty-two, I'm 

 sure. But I notice that the older a woman gets the 

 more proposals she can remember. 



Cecily whispered to me what a joke it would be 

 if we could only put all the myriad lovers into the 

 same cage, and let them fight the matter out as bucks 

 and tigers do. I said very likely they wouldn't do it, 

 and it would end like a great scorpion and tarantula 

 battle we once went to see. Instead of fighting they 

 were tremendous pals, and took to one another like 

 anything. 



Miss Potts spent her entire day with her front hair 

 wound in and out of a spiky fence of tin arrange- 

 ments, and this chevaux-de-frise was only let out for 

 a brief half-hour before bed-time, when it didn't 

 matter, and in this resplendent condition our friend 

 considered her "bang," as she termed the mass of 



