ig log,
hidden by sticks of pine and hickory, was sputtering Christmas cheer
with a blaze and crackle that warmed body and heart and home. That night
the friends came from afar and near; and that night Bob, the faithful,
valiant Bob, in a dress-suit that was his own and new, and Mrs.
Crittenden's own gift, led the saucy Molly, robed as no other dusky
bride at Canewood was ever arrayed, into the dining-room, while the
servants crowded the doors and hallway and the white folk climbed the
stairs to give them room. And after a few solemn moments, Bob caught the
girl in his arms and smacked her lips loudly:

"Now, gal, I reckon I got yer!" he cried; and whites and blacks broke
into jolly laughter, and the music of fiddles rose in the kitchen, where
there was a feast for Bob's and Molly's friends. Rose, too, the music of
fiddles under the stairway in the hall, and Mrs. Crittenden and Judge
Page, and Crittenden and Mrs. Stanton, and Judith and Basil, and none
other than Grafton and radiant little Phyllis led the way for the
opening quadrille. It was an old-fashioned Christmas the mother wanted,
and an old-fashioned Christmas, with the dance and merriment and the
graces of the old days, that the mother had. Over the portrait of the
eldest Crittenden, who slept in Cuba, hung the flag of the single star
that would never bend its colours again to Spain. Above the blazing log
and over the fine, strong face of the brave father, who had fought to
dissolve the Union, hung the Stars and Bars--proudly. And over the brave
brother, who looked down from the north wall, hung proudly the Stars and
Stripes for which he had given his young life.

Then came toasts after the good old fashion--graceful toasts--to the
hostess and the brides, to the American soldier, regular and volunteer.
And at the end, Crittenden, regular, raised his glass and there was a
hush.

It was good, he said, to go back to the past; good to revive and hold
fast to the ideals that time had proven best for humanity; good to go
back to the earth, like the Titans, for fresh strength; good for the
man, the State, the nation. And it was best for the man to go back to
the ideals that had dawned at his mother's knee; for there was the
fountain-head of the nation's faith in its God, man's faith in his
nation--man's faith in his fellow and faith in himself. And he drank to
one who represented his own early ideals better than he should ever
realize them for himself. Then he rais