in; and, oh! she's a miserable, worried girl, not a bit
like the old Patty."

Mark held her close and smoothed the curls under the loose brown hood.
"Don't you fret, Patty darling! I'm not the boy I was last week. Every
word you say makes me more of a man. At first I would have run away just
for the joke; anything to get you away from the other fellows and prove
I was the best man, but now' I'm sobered down, too. I'll do nothing
rash; I'll be as staid as the judge you want me to be twenty years
later. You've made me over, Patty, and if my love for you wasn't the
right sort at first, it is now. I wish the road to New Hampshire was
full of lions and I could fight my way through them just to show you how
strong I feel!"

"There'll be lions enough," smiled Patty through her tears, "though they
won't have manes and tails; but I can imagine how father will roar, and
how my courage will ooze out of the heels of my boots!"

"Just let me catch the Deacon roaring at my wife!" exclaimed Mark with
a swelling chest. "Now, run along, Patty dear, for I don't want you
scolded on my account. There's sure to be only a day or two of waiting
now, and I shall soon see the signal waving from your window. I'll sound
Ellen and see if she's brave enough to be one of the eloping party.
Good-night! Good-night! Oh! How I hope our going away will be to-morrow,
my dearest, dearest Patty!"

WINTER

XXVI. A WEDDING-RING

THE snow had come. It had begun to fall softly and steadily at the
beginning of the week, and now for days it had covered the ground deeper
and deeper, drifting about the little red brick house on the hilltop,
banking up against the barn, and shrouding the sheds and the smaller
buildings. There had been two cold, still nights; the windows were
covered with silvery landscapes whose delicate foliage made every
pane of glass a leafy bower, while a dazzling crust bediamonded the
hillsides, so that no eye could rest on them long without becoming
snow-blinded.

Town-House Hill was not as well travelled as many others, and Deacon
Baxter had often to break his own road down to the store, without
waiting for the help of the village snow-plough to make things easier
for him. Many a path had Waitstill broken in her time, and it was by
no means one of her most distasteful tasks--that of shovelling into the
drifts of heaped-up whiteness, tossing them to one side or the other,
and cutting a narrow, clean-edged track that would