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Presently during the singing of a hymn Mather saw her coming down the aisle toward him, and his heart stood still. She stopped beside him, and her face flushed.

"Were you looking for-for salvation?" she faltered.

"No," said he quietly, "I was looking for-you."

She looked a trifle frightened. He saw the color suddenly leave her cheeks. "Please sit down for a minute," he begged. She hesitated, then reluctantly complied. The hymn still went on stridently. Mather looked thoughtfully at the unshaded gas jets above the platform for a time.

"I need you more than the Army does," he said at length. "I want you to leave it."

"Oh!" she gasped, drawing away from him.

"I realize you know nothing about me," he went on hurriedly. "I'm foreman in a machine shop. I make good wages. So far I've lived a life I'm not ashamed of. But I want you to satisfy yourself as to the truth of all this, of

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Come the boys, like a flock of sheep,
Hailing the snow piled white and deep;
Past the woman, so old and gray,
Hastened the children on their way,

Nor offered a helping hand to her,
So meek, so timid, afraid to stir

Lest the carriage wheels or horses' feet
Should crowd her down on the slippery street.
At last came one of the merry troop,
The gayest laddie of all the group.

He paused beside her and whispered low,
"I'll help you across if you wish to go."
Her aged hand on his strong young arm
She placed. And so without hurt or harm
He guided her trembling feet along,
Proud that his own were firm and strong.

Then back again to his friends he went,
His young heart happy and well content.
"She's somebody's mother, boys, you know,
For all she's aged and poor and slow;
"And I hope some fellow will lend a hand
To help my mother, you understand,

"If ever she's poor and old and gray, When her own dear son is far away."

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BY VIRGINIA LEILA WENTZ.

Copyright, 1906, by W. R. Caldwell.

It was a warm spring evening, so warm that they had ventured to sit out on the little wooden veranda. There was a suggestion of approaching summer in the breeze, and the air was redolent with lilacs. By glancing toward the right it was not difficult to see where the fragrance came from. On the other side of the hedge in the deepening twilight was a purple forest of plumes, and beyond that, white in the gray light, rose the old Howard house, the oldest in the tiny village as well as the largest. Selden Howard was the only living representative of the family.

Presently the group on Mrs. Jones' veranda began to speak of Selden, leading up to the subject from the fragrance of the bushes.

"Them lilocks is sickishly sweet," observed Mrs. Jones herself.

"Really nauseating," acquiesced the boarder who had been spending the winter here in this little cottage among the Berkshire hills. "By the way, I saw a strange man at the postoffice this morning and I overheard someone say he was Mr. How

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ing with too much work and had caught a breath of outside air. But that was so different. From that window she could look out only on clotheslines, sheds, the back windows of the boarding houses on the next street, and there whatever restful thoughts might come to her were made havoc of by an accordion, cheap coon songs or the caterwauling of feline creatures on the fences below.

And now-oh, the feathery, pale florescence of the lilacs over yonder! Katherine drew her breath in with delight as their dominant scent came up to her. If only her dear mother could be with her to enjoy the beauty of it all! But that had not been possible. When the physician

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went upstairs to her bedroom. She looked at the high mound of featherbed and at the small window at the foot into which was already flooding the spring moonlight. For a moment she stood irresolute; then she lowered the shade, slipped on a cheesecloth kimono, drew the pins from her hair, letting it fall about her shoulders, blew out the lamp and followed her whim to lean from the casement.

It had been a very long while since Katherine Hope had looked from a win. dow over a garden when the moon was shining. True, from the window of their stodgy city lodgings on Eleventh street, her mother's and hers, she had leaned out at times when her head was hot and ach

had shaken his head gravely over his young patient's wornout condition and commanded an immediate change in the country it had been all that mother and daughter could do to scrape together the meager savings for Katherine's rest of a fortnight. And Katherine was not one to mew and whimper over impossibilities. She was here now, and she would make the best of every moment to grow strong and well again that she might go back with new life to her office work and the companionship of her sacrificing little mother.

The mild country air and the thousand odors of the spring played upon her face and lifted her loosened hair, gilded by

the moonshine into the likeness of an aureole. Her white kimono fell softly around her; from the position in which she held her arms her soft elbows were plainly visible, and her exquisite face, leaning back a bit against the dark painted frame of the window, stood out like a

cameo.

The girl was little conscious of anything except the wonder of the night, nor was she aware of one who watched her a moment from the shadow of the lilacs in the garden beyond the hedge. Selden Howard was returning from his dog kennels, whither he had gone to look after a sick collie, when his eye had chanced to fall upon the figure in the casement, and in sheer artistic appreciation had rested there.

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'She's like some young princess," he thought to himself, pursuing his way toward the big house, "or a goddess. Her hair's like the silvery floss around corn. Her name ought to be Perdita, Marpessa or Ariadne. How ever in the world did the Jones family stumble across such a creature?" The glamor of the girl wove itself into his dreams, and in waking intervals he pondered on plans for an acquaintance. "Ah, ha, I have it!" at last laughed he.

Early the next morning he went afishing. As luck would have it, he secured a well filled creel. On his way home, without ceremony, he lifted the latch of Mrs. Jones' low back gate and entered. He walked right up to the kitchen window, for there stood Mrs. Jones rolling the dough for breakfast biscuits.

"Good morning, Mrs. Jones," said he. "I've got such a jolly big creel full of fish here that I don't know what to do with them. There's no one over there" -nodding toward the big white house"but my housekeeper, and she's sick this morning; so I'm wondering if you'll accept these?" With the gallantry of a knight he held out to her his creel.

"Oh, Mr. Selden!" exclaimed the good woman, a bit flustered, but smiling with unmistakable appreciation. (Would the heavens fall next? When had Mr. Selden Howard last honored her humble dwelling like this? Surely not since his mother died, poor soul!) "Accept them? Well, I just guess I will! And so Mrs. Patch is sick! Well, you'll just stay here to breakfast. It'll be all ready in fifteen minutes." This was as much as Howard had hoped for.

"You're awfully kind, Mrs. Jones," he said, affecting surprise. "And-yes, I believe I'll stay. I've a sick collie over in the kennels. I'll go back and look after her; then I'll be back to accept your hospitality."

When Katherine Hope entered the dining-room Mrs. Jones of course presented Mr. Howard.

"How do you do, Mr. Howard," said she conventionally, with a smile, a little tired in spite of the play of childish dimples. But Selden was looking down admiringly on the fine, white parting that separated the braids of purest flax.

"And how d'ye like them, Mr. Selden?" asked Mrs. Jones a bit later, referring to the biscuits.

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I love them," answered he, referring to the girl's dimples.

Her

Of course that was only the beginning. After that Selden Howard managed almost daily to meet Katherine, or at least to catch a glimpse of her. lovely, tired eyes and little, quiet ways appealed to him in an infinitely more tender and real fashion than had those of many a pampered beauty whom he'd met in the course of his varied travels.

One morning Katherine was reading "The House of Mirth" out on the veranda. At least she was supposed to be reading it. In reality she had closed the book, keeping the page marked with her slim forefinger. She had only two days more here in God's green earth, and the lilacs seemed to be calling her imperatively. She had been breathing in lilacs to that extent that her thoughts seemed to be fairly scented with them. All at once an impulse of yielding came to her. Why in the world should she not step over the low hedge and go into the lilac garden?

She did. Bees hung above the purple bloom, and a little attenuated fountain tinkled in the distance. Oh, it was altogether enchanting. Just then a goldeneyed sable collie came leisurely down the curved walk to meet her.

"You beauty!" cried the girl exultantly, stooping to pat the dog's queenly head. The collie, with slowly swishing tail, gently kissed her behind the ear.

A commanding whistle from around the turn of the walk, and then:

"Mollie, Mollie, old girl, where are you?" Mollie sat with one ear up, the other down, as collies will when perplexed. She loved her master-but also she loved her new found friend.

"Ah?" cried Selden, coming upon them unexpectedly. "But it is beautiful to find you in my garden?" he said, looking gladly upon Katherine. "Do you know, last night I dreamed you were here. You are very, very welcome, little lady."

"You see," she exclaimed helplessly, trying to hide her telltale blushes, "it was the lilacs. They called me."

Suddenly he took both her hands in his and drew her toward the bushes.

"Dear lilacs," he whispered whimsically, "she is here now-on enchanted

ground-and we must keep her. You belong to my garden," he added masterfully, turning full upon Katherine, "and I will not let you go. The house yonder is very lonely and waits for you. You will stay?"

Her answer? Well, she was a girl and very tired, and he was a man and strong -and it was spring-and they were among the lilacs!

Why I Married Young.

BY EDNA JOHNSON WARREN.

My father was an old engineer and that probably accounts for it all. I had a brother several years my senior, who had worked his way to the whistle-side of the

fully and went downstairs where my mother, with tears in her eyes, wished me luck, and I sallied forth to the office of the superintendent of motive power. My father, by previous arrangement, met me there and I, with trembling limbs lest I be refused a job, walked in.

I was so excited at the time that I remember very little of what took place, but I succeeded in getting a trial, and the following day I entered the engine house with my new dinner pail and a very smiling face. I was kept in the yard for about a week, and one night when I went in to "wash up" before going home, I saw the foreman coming toward me with a paper in his hand. I was much afraid something had happened and my fears were

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cab and at last I had arrived at the longedfor age of being old enough to "go firing." When a very small child, I had received for a birthday gift a miniature engine from my father. It was made by a skilled mechanic and was an unusually good production. A lever would allow it to run and the small wheels turned much to my delight. From that time I decided to follow in my father's footsteps and become a first-class engineman.

My surprise can perhaps be imagined when, at the age of 16 or 17, I was told that plans were in progress for sending me away to school at which I was to fit myself for a lawyer. I immediately made my rights known, and after much evident disappointment from a few members of the family, I was told to choose for myself.

The next morning I dressed very care

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not groundless. He had a letter which said that I was to make my first trip on the road that night. I had no time to get any supper, much to my regret, but I started for the engine upon which the journey was to be made, as soon as I had sent word to mother that I should not be home until the next morning. In about an hour, with Tom Black taking it easy on the right hand side of the cab and myself working harder than ever before in my life, we left the switch lights behind us and passed into the darkness with no sound around us except the exhaust from the engine, which seemed to grow weaker as we started to climb the heavy grade.

The hand on the gauge began to work backward and just as it reached 100 Tom Black quietly gave up his seat to the head brakeman, who was an old-time fireman,

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