have changed. When I was courting, the whole neighborhood was talking about it, and knew I was accepted long before I did. Did you see all this going on, Maggie?"

"Certainly," she answered.

"Now I don't believe Amy saw it herself," cried Leonard, half desperately, and laughter broke out anew.

"Oh, Amy, I'm so glad!" said Burt; and he gave her the counterpart of the embrace that had turned the bright October evening black to Webb.

"To think that Webb should have got such a prize!" ejaculated Leonard. "Well, well! the boys in this family are in luck." "It will be my turn next," cried Johnnie.

ble to the soil? We'll return this to the soil," she said, kissing his forehead, “although I think it is too rich for me already."

In the afternoon she and Webb, with a sleigh well laden, drove into the mountains on a visit to Lumley. He had repaired the rough, rocky lane leading through the wood to what was no longer a wretched hovel. The inmates had been expecting this visit, and Lumley rushed bareheaded out-of-doors the moment he heard the bells. Although he had swept a path from his door again and again, the high wind would almost instantly drift in the snow. Poor Lumley had never heard of Sir Walter Raleigh or Queen Elizabeth, but he had given his homage to a better

"Let's have supper," Ned remarked, removing his thumb from his mouth.

"Score one for Ned," said Burt. "There is at least one member of the family whose head is not turned by all these marvellous events."

Can the sunshine and fragrance of a June day be photographed? No more can the light and gladness of that long happy evening be portrayed. Mrs. Clifford held Gertrude's hand, as she had Amy's when receiving her as a daughter. The beautiful girl, whose unmistakable metropolitan air was blended with gentle womanly grace, had a strong fascination for the invalid. She kindled the imagination of the recluse, and gave her a glimpse into a world she had never known.

There were bustle and renewed mystery on the following day. Astonishinglooking packages were smuggled out of trunks and closets, and from one room to another. Ned created a succession of panics, and at last the ubiquitous and garrulous little urchin had to be tied into a chair. Johnnie and Alf were in the seventh heaven of anticipation; and when Webb brought Amy a check for fifty dollars, and told her that it was the proceeds of the first crop from his brains, and that she must spend the money, she went into Mr. Clifford's room, waving it as if it were a trophy such as no knight had ever brought to his lady-love.

"Of course I'll spend it," she cried. "I know just how to spend it. It shall go into books that we can read together. What's that agricultural jargon of yours, Webb, about returning as much as possi

ly threw off his coat and laid it on the snow, that Amy might walk dry-shod into the single room that formed his home. She and Webb smiled significantly at each other, and then the young girl put her hand into that of the mountaineer as he helped her from the sleigh, and said, "Merry Christmas!" with a smile that brought tears into the eyes of the grateful man.

"Yer making no empty wish, Miss Amy. I never thought sich a Christmas 'ud ever come to me and mine. But come in-come in out of the cold wind, an' see how you've changed everything. Go in with her, Mr. Webb, an' I'll tie an' blanket yer hoss. Lord! to think that sich a May blossom 'ud go into my hut!"

They entered, and Mrs. Lumley, neatly clad in some dark woollen material, made a queer, old-fashioned courtesy that her husband had had her practice for the occasion.

Two

But the baby, now grown into a plump, healthy child, greeted her benefactress with nature's own grace, crowing, laughing, and calling, "Pitty lady, nice lady," with exuberant welcome. logs, reaching across a dirty floor and pushed together, did not furnish precarious warmth now, but a neat box, painted green, was filled with billets of wood. The carpeted floor was scrupulously clean, and so was the bright new furniture. A few evergreen wreaths hung on the walls with the pictures that Amy had given, and on the mantel was her photograph - poor Lumley's patron saint.

Webb brought in his armful of gifts, and Amy took the child on her lap, and opened a volume of dear old Mother Goose, profusely illustrated in colored prints

that classic that appeals alike to the hearts of children whether in mountain hovels or city palaces. The man looked on as if dazed. "Mr. Webb," he said, in his loud whisper, "I once saw a picter of the Virgin and Child. Oh, golly! how she favors it!"

"Mrs. Lumley," Amy began, "I think your housekeeping does you much credit. I've not seen a neater room anywhere."

"Well, mum, my ole man's turned over a new leaf, sure 'nuff. There's no livin' with him unless everythink is jes so, an' I guess it's better so, too. Ef I let things get slack, he gets mighty savage."

"You must try to be patient, Mr. Lumley. You've made great changes for the better, but you must remember that old ways can't be broken up in a moment."

"Lor' bless yer, Miss Amy, there's nothink like breakin' off short; there's nothink like turnin' the corner sharp, and fightin' the devil tooth and nail. It's an awful tussle at first, an' I thought I was goin' to knuckle under more'n once. So I would weren't it fer you, but you gave me this little han', Miss Amy, an' looked at me as if I weren't a beast, an' it's been a-liftin' me up ever since. Oh, I've had good folks talk at me an' lecter, an' I've been in jail, but it all on'y made me mad. The best on 'em wouldn't 'a teched me any more than they would a rattler sich as we killed on the mounting. But you guv me yer han', Miss Amy, an' thar's mine on it agin. I'm goin' to be a man.”

She took the great horny palm in both her hands. "You make me very happy," she said, simply, looking at him above the head of his child, "and I'm sure your wife is going to help you. I shall enjoy the holidays far more for this visit. You've told us good news, and we've got good news for you and your wife. Tell him, Webb."

"Yes, Lumley," said Webb, clapping the man on the shoulder, "famous news. This little girl has been helping me just as much as she has you, and she has promised to help me through life. One of these days we shall have a home of our own, and you shall have a cottage near it, and the little girl here that you've named Amy shall go to school, and have a better chance than you and your wife have had."

"Oh, gosh walader!" exclaimed the man, almost breaking out into a hornpipe. "The Lord on'y knows what will happen ef things once git a-goin' right!

Mr.

It was hard for them to get away. The child dropped her books and toys, and clung to Amy. "She knows yer; she knows all about yer," said the delighted father. "Well, ef yer must go, yer'll take suthin' with us;" and from a great pitcher of milk he filled several goblets, and they all drank to the health of little Amy. "Yer'll fin' a half-dozen pa'tridges under the seat, Miss Amy," he said, as they drove away. "I was boun' I'd have some kind of a present fer yer."

She waved her hand back to him, and saw him standing bare-headed in the cutting wind, looking after her.

"Poor old Lumley was right," said Webb, drawing her to him. "I do feel as if I had received my little girl from heaWe will give those people a chance, and try to turn the law of heredity in the right direction."

ven.

In the twilight of that evening Mr. Alvord sat over his lonely hearth, his face buried in his hands. The day had been terribly long and torturing; memory had presented, like mocking spectres, his past, and what it might have been. A sense of loneliness, a horror of great darkness, overwhelmed him. Nature had grown

cold and forbidding, and was losing its power to solace. Johnnie, absorbed in her Christmas preparations, had not been to see him for a long time. He had gone to inquire after her on the previous evening, and through the lighted windows of the Clifford home had seen a picture that had made his own abode appear desolate indeed. In despairing bitterness he had turned away, feeling that that happy home was no more a place for him than heaven. He had wandered out into the storm for hours, like a lost spirit, and at last had returned, and slept in utter exhaustion. On the morning preceding Christmas memory awoke with him, and as night approached he was sinking into sullen, dreary apathy.

There was a light tap at the door, but he did not hear it. A child's face peered in at his window, and Johnnie saw him cowering over his dying fire. She had learned to be fearless, for she had banished his evil spells before. Therefore she entered softly, laid down her bundles, and stood beside him.