Page:About people (IA aboutpeople00well).pdf/225

cubus of caste far less than the Americans. Difference in station is an Old-World fact with which the Irish and their ancestors have long been familiar. Their church frowns on any combination for intellectual purposes which might disintegrate their religious faith, and the sodalities themselves supply avenues for social intercourse, with the added benefit of spiritual instruction.

Among the Western women who are farmers, caste is founded on the aristocracy of energy; she who makes the best butter, "raises" the finest hens, "steps round smartest," and cooks the biggest dinner for the largest number of farm hands, is the leader. At the harvest festivals and the county fairs, the wives of the poor and of the rich farmer meet on the same social plane; the one assuming and the other acknowledging the superiority born of deftness and strength. The hired girl is a neighbor's daughter, who will soon marry, have a farm, and be just the same as the woman for whom she