Love's Golden Thread

Little sweetheart, stand up strong, Gird the armour on your knight; * * * * * There are battles to be fought, There are victories to be won, Righteous labours to be wrought, Valiant races to be run: Grievous wrongs to be retrieved, Right and justice to be done: * * * * * Little sweetheart, stand up strong, Gird the armour on your knight: Sing your bravest, sing your song, Speak your word for truth and right. ANNIE L. MUZZEY.

"You know, Doris, to-morrow I shall be of age and shall come into my inheritance, the inheritance which my dear father left me," and the speaker sighed lightly, as his thoughts went back for an instant to the parent whose loving presence he still missed, although years had passed since he died.

"Yes, dear, I know," said Doris, lifting sweet sympathising eyes to his. "And, Bernard, it will be a trust from him; he knew you would use it well; you will feel almost as if you were a steward for him--for him and God," she added, almost inaudibly.

He gave her a quick nod of assent. "Money is a talent," he said, "and of course I shall do heaps of good with mine. But you know, dear, I've not got such a wise young head as yours. I shall be sure to make heaps of blunders, and, in short, do more harm than good unless you help me."

He looked at her very meaningly. But her eyes were fixed on the green grass of the hill on which they were sitting, and instead of answering she said, rather irrelevantly, "You will be a man to-morrow; quite legally a man. I'm thinking you'll have to form your own opinions then, and act upon your own responsibility."

"Well, yes. And one day does not make much difference. I am a man now." He held himself up rather proudly; but the next moment, as "self passed out of sight," he drew nearer to his companion, looking down into her sweet flushed face very wistfully.

"To-morrow will make a difference," she said lightly:

"The little more, and how much it is! And the little less, and what miles away!"

she quoted.

"I was thinking of those lines, too," said the youth, "but not in connection with my coming of age. Doris, dear, the day after to-morrow I shall return to Oxford." He hesitated.

"Yes, I am sorry you are going."

"Not half so sorry as I am to have to leave you!" he exclaimed. "However, it is my last term at Oxford. When I return next time it will be to stay." He hesitated a little, and then, summoning his courage, added hastily, "Doris, couldn't we become engaged?"

The girl looked up, startled, yet with love and happiness shining in her bright blue eyes. "Is it your wish?" she asked. "Is it really and truly your wish?"

Bernard assured her that it was, and moreover that he had loved her all his life, even when as children they played together at making mud-pies and building castles in the sand, on the rare and joyous occasions when their holidays were passed at the seaside.

"You see, dear," he proceeded, after a few blissful moments, while the autumn sunshine fell caressingly upon their bright young faces, "I am rather young and could not speak to you quite like this if it were not that to-morrow I shall be fairly well off. My money--oh, it seems caddish to speak of money just now!--is invested in Consols, therefore quite safe, and it will give me an income of L500 a year. We shall be able to live on that, Doris."

"Yes." The girl looked down shyly, her cheeks becoming pinker, and her blue eyes shining. She was only nineteen, and she loved him very dearly.