oned on that
July day to hide some shabbiness underneath. But she bade the colonel
sit down, and they chatted of old times and old places and old faces
for a few minutes; and the colonel, to whom any sort of social
function was a rare and sweet occasion, stayed until the nurse had to
beckon him out of the room over Mrs. Barclay's shoulder.

General Ward sent a note with a bunch of monthly blooming roses.

"MY DEAR JANE (he wrote): These roses are from slips we got from
John's mother when we planted our little yard. This red one is from
the very bush on which grew the rose John wore at his wedding. Pin
it on the old scamp to-night, and see how he will look. He was a
dapper little chap that night, and the years have hardly begun their
work on him; or perhaps he is such a tough customer that he dulls
the chisel of time. I do not know, and so long as it is so, you do
not care, but we both know, and are both glad that of all the many
things God has sent you in thirty years, he has sent you nothing so
fine as the joy that came with the day John wore this rose for
you--a joy that has grown while the rose has faded. And may this
rose renew your joy for another thirty years."

John read the note when he came in from the mill that evening, and
Jane watched the years slip off his face. He looked into the past as
it spread itself on the carpet near the bed.

"Well, well, well," he said, as he smiled into the picture he saw, "I
remember as well the general bringing that rose down to the office
that morning, wrapped in blue tissue paper from cotton batting rolls!
The package was tied with fancy red braid that used to bind muslin
bolts." He laughed quietly, and asked, "Jane, do you remember that old
red braid?" The sick woman nodded. "Well, with the little blue package
was a note from Miss Lucy, which said that my old teacher could not
give me a present that year--times were cruelly hard then, you
remember--but that she could and did put the blessing of her prayers
on the rose, that all that it witnessed at my wedding would bring me
happiness." He sat for a moment in silence, and, as the nurse was
gone, he knelt beside the sick woman and kissed her. And as the wife
stroked his head she whispered, "How that prayer has been answered,
John--dear, hasn't it?" And the great clock in the silent hall below
ticked away some of the happiest minutes it had ever measured.

But when he passed o