ious signs of emotion.

The exercises went on very pleasingly until they came to the awarding of
the gold medal of the year and the valedictory, which was to be delivered
by the young lady to whom it was to be presented. The name was called;
it was one not unfamiliar to our ears, and the bearer of it--the Delilah
of our tea-table, Avis as she was known in the school and elsewhere--rose
in her place and came forward, so that for the first time on that day, we
looked upon her. It was a sensation for The Teacups. Our modest, quiet
waiting-girl was the best scholar of her year. We had talked French
before her, and we learned that she was the best French scholar the
teacher had ever had in the school. We had never thought of her except as
a pleasing and well-trained handmaiden, and here she was an accomplished
young lady.

Avis went through her part very naturally and gracefully, and when it was
finished, and she stood before us with the medal glittering on her
breast, we did not know whether to smile or to cry,--some of us did one,
and some the other.--We all had an opportunity to see her and
congratulate her before we left the institution. The mystery of her six
weeks' serving at our table was easily solved. She had been studying too
hard and too long, and required some change of scene and occupation. She
had a fancy for trying to see if she could support herself as so many
young women are obliged to, and found a place with us, the Mistress only
knowing her secret.

"She is to be our young Doctor's wife!" the Mistress whispered to me, and
did some more crying, not for grief, certainly.

Whether our young Doctor's long visits to a neighboring town had anything
to do with the fact that Avis was at that institution, whether she was
the patient he visited or not, may be left in doubt. At all events, he
had always driven off in the direction which would carry him to the place
where she was at school.

I have attended a large number of celebrations, commencements, banquets,
soirees, and so forth, and done my best to help on a good many of them.
In fact, I have become rather too well known in connection with
"occasions," and it has cost me no little trouble. I believe there is no
kind of occurrence for which I have not been requested to contribute
something in prose or verse. It is sometimes very hard to say no to the
requests. If one is in the right mood when he or she writes an
occasional poem, it seems as if nothing could