first, and then all else in the way of good things would follow.

The girl or boy who acquires the habit of thrift early in life will be a power for good in any community. Thrift! It is the basis of all the other virtues. To spend less than you earn-this way lies happiness. Thrift!

The Boy from Missouri Valley

ELL, it was n't so very long ago— only about twenty-three years. I was foreman of a factory, and he lived a thousand miles away, at Missouri Valley, Iowa. I was twenty-four, and he was fourteen. His brother was traveling for the Firm, and one day this brother showed me a letter from the lad in Missouri Valley. The missive was so painstaking, so exact, and revealed the soul of a child so vividly, that I laughed aloud-a laugh that died away to a sigh

The boy was beating his wings against the

bars the bars of Missouri Valley-he wanted opportunity. And all he got was unending toil, dead monotony, stupid misunderstanding, and corn-bread and molasses ¶ There was n't love enough in Missouri. Valley to go 'round—that was plain. The boy's mother had been of the Nancy Hanks type-worn, yellow and sad-and had given up the fight and been left to sleep her long sleep in a prairie grave on one of the many migrations. The father's ambition had got stuck in the mud, and under the tongue-lash of a strident, strenuous, gee-haw consort, he had run up the white flag.

The boy wanted to come East.

It was a dubious investment-a sort of financial plunge, a blind pool—to send for this buckwheat midget. The fare was thirtythree dollars and fifty cents.

The Proprietor, a cautious man, said that the boy wasn't worth the money. There were plenty of boys-the alleys swarmed with them.

So there the matter rested.

But the lad in Missouri Valley did n't let it

rest long. He had been informed that we did not consider him worth thirty-three dollars and fifty cents, so he offered to split the difference. He would come for half-he could ride on half-fare—the Railroad Agent at Missouri Valley said that if he bought a half-fare ticket, got on a train, and explained to the conductor and everybody that he was 'leven, goin' on twelve, and stuck to it, it would be all right; and he would not expect any wages until he had paid us back. He had no money of his own, all he earned was taken from him by the kind folks with whom he lived, and would be until he was twenty-one years old. Did we want to invest sixteen dollars and seventy-five cents in him?

We waxed reckless and sent the money— more than that, we sent a twenty-dollar bill. We plunged!

In just a week the investment arrived. He did not advise when he would come, or how. He came, we saw, he conquered. Why should he advise of his coming? He just reported, and his first words were the Duke's motto: "I am here."

He was unnecessarily freckled and curiously small. His legs had the Greek curve, from much horseback riding, herding cattle on the prairies; his hair was the color of a Tamworth pig; his hands were red; his wrists bony and briar-scarred. He carried his shoes in his hands, so as not to wear out the sidewalk, or because they aggravated sundry stone-bruises-I don't know which.

"I am here!" said the lad, and he planked down on the desk three dollars and twentyfive cents. It was the change from the twenty-dollar bill. "Did n't you have to spend any money on the way here?" I asked.

"No, I had all I wanted to eat," he replied, and pointed to a basket that sat on the floor

I called in the Proprietor, and we looked the lad over. We walked around him twice, gazed at each other, and adjourned to the hallway for consultation.

The boy was not big enough to do a man's work and if we set him to work in the factory with the city boys, they would surely

pick on him and make life for him very uncomfortable. He had a half-sad and winsome look that had won from our hard hearts something akin to pity. He was so innocent, so full of faith, and we saw at a glance that he had been overworked, underfed-at least misfed-and underloved. He was different from other boys-and in spite of the grime of travel, and the freckles, he was pretty as a ground-squirrel.

His faith made him whole: he won us. But why we had brought him to the miserable and dirty city-this grim place of disillusionment! "He might index the letter-book," I ventured. "That's it, yes, let him index the letter-book." So I went back and got the letter-book. But the boy's head only came to the top of the stand-up desk, and when he reached for the letter-book on the desk he had to grope for it. I gave him my highstool, but this was too low.

"I know what to do," he said. Through the window that looked from the office to the shipping-room, he had espied a pile of boxes. "I know what to do!"