ch other in rapid
succession, and then all of a sudden it flashed upon him who this was.

"Charlie!" he exclaimed, trembling with astonishment; and next moment
the poor prodigal was on his knees beside his friend's bed, sobbing,
with his head buried in his hands.

Don't laugh at him, reader, for thus forgetting himself. Tom Drift had
been through many trials you know nothing about, and out of those trials
he had come broken in spirit and as humble as a child. _You_ might have
had more regard for appearances, perhaps, and controlled your emotion
genteelly; but, as I have said before, Tom Drift was not anything like
so strong-minded as you. So he knelt there and sobbed; and Charlie, as
he lay, took his hand into his own, and held it.

Presently he said, softly, "Tom!"

Tom looked up and rose to his feet.

"What, old fellow?"

"Look here, Tom!" said Charlie, showing me.

At the sight of me, bruised and battered as I was, Tom's feelings
overcame him again. He seized me eagerly, and looked long and tenderly
into my face; then his tears came again, and once more he sunk on his
knees at Charlie's side and buried his face in his hands.

The place was getting dark. The noise of voices outside and the distant
roar of guns slowly died away; the guards for the night were called out,
and one by one soldier and invalid fell asleep after their hard day's
toil. But Tom Drift never moved from Charlie's bedside, nor did
Charlie, by word or movement, disturb him. In the silence of that night
I seemed to be back in the past--when, years ago, I first knew these
two. The dreary hospital changed, in my imagination, into the old
Randlebury dormitory.

These beds all round were occupied not by wounded soldiers, but by
soundly-sleeping boys, worn out with sports or study. And the two
between whom I lay were no longer suffering men, but the light-hearted
lads of long ago. I could almost fancy myself ticking through the
silent watches; and when now and then the fingers that held me closed
over me, or fondled me tenderly, I could almost have believed I heard
the low sweet whistling of an innocent boy as he furtively turned in his
waking moments to his father's precious gift.

It all seemed so strangely natural that as I woke from my dream it
required an effort to remember where I really was. All was silent
around me. I peered first at my master, then at Tom Drift; they were
both asleep--sleeping, perhaps, as simply as ever t