e means that the work which warms the heart is greater than that which
freezes the blood, I suspect. Moor knew what you could do and has made
you do it, sure that if you worked for fame unconsciously you should
achieve it. This is a success that I can appreciate, and I congratulate
you heartily, my son."

"Thank you, sir. But upon my word I don't understand it, and if this
wasn't written by the best Art critic in the country I should feel
inclined to say the writer was a fool. Why that little thing was a daub
compared to the other."

He got no farther in his protest against this unexpected freak of
fortune, for Sylvia seized the paper and read the paragraph aloud with
such happy emphasis amid Prue's outcries and his father's applause, that
Mark began to feel that he really had done something praiseworthy, and
that the "daub" was not so despicable after all.

"I'm going to look at it from this new point of sight," was his sole
comment as he went away.

Three hours afterward he appeared to Sylvia as she sat sewing alone, and
startled her with the mysterious announcement.

"I've done it!"

"Done what? Have you burnt poor Clytemnestra?"

"Hang Clytemnestra! I'll begin at the beginning and prepare you for the
grand finale. I went to the Exhibition, and stared at Father Blake and
his family for an hour. Decided that wasn't bad, though I still admire
the other more. Then people began to come and crowd up, so that I
slipped away for I couldn't stand the compliments. Dahlmann, Scott, and
all the rest of my tribe were there, and, as true as my name is Mark
Yule, every man of them ignored the Greek party and congratulated me
upon the success of that confounded Golden Wedding."

"My dearest boy, I am so proud! so glad! What is the matter? Have you
been bitten by a tarantula?"

She might well ask, for Mark was dancing all over the carpet in a most
extraordinary style, and only stopped long enough to throw a little case
into Sylvia's lap, asking as a whole faceful of smiles broke loose--

"What does that mean?"

She opened it, and a suspicious circlet of diamonds appeared, at sight
of which she clapped her hands, and cried out--

"You're going to ask Jessie to wear it!"

"I have! I have!" sung Mark, dancing more wildly than ever. Sylvia
chased him into a corner and held him there, almost as much excited as
he, while she demanded a full explanation, which he gave her, laughing
like a boy, and blushing like a girl.

"