tugs at the man as it tugs at the woman; the smirk of the well-fitted
prince is no different from the smirk of the Sunday-clad peasant; and
the veins of the elders tingle with the same thrill that sets their
fresh-frocked grandchildren skipping. Never trust people who pretend
that they have no joy in their new clothes.

Let not our souls be wrung, however, at contemplation of the luckless
urchin cut off by parental penury from the rapture of new clothes. Just
as the heroes of his dreams are his immediate seniors, so his heroes'
clothes share the glamour, and the reversion of them carries a high
privilege--a special thing not sold by Swears and Wells. The sword of
Galahad--and of many another hero--arrived on the scene already hoary
with history, and the boy rather prefers his trousers to be legendary,
famous, haloed by his hero's renown--even though the nap may have
altogether vanished in the process.

But, putting clothes aside, there are other matters in which this
reversed heirship comes into play. Take the case of Toys. It is hardly
right or fitting--and in this the child quite acquiesces--that as he
approaches the reverend period of nine or say ten years, he should still
be the unabashed and proclaimed possessor of a hoop and a Noah's Ark.
The child will quite see the reasonableness of this, and, the goal of
his ambition being now a catapult, a pistol, or even a sword-stick, will
be satisfied that the titular ownership should lapse to his juniors, so
far below him in their kilted or petticoated incompetence. After all,
the things are still there, and if relapses of spirit occur, on wet
afternoons, one can still (nominally) borrow them and be happy on
the floor as of old, without the reproach of being a habitual baby
toy-caresser. Also one can pretend it's being done to amuse the younger
ones.

None of us, therefore, grumbled when in the natural course of things the
nominal ownership of the toys slipped down to Harold, and from him in
turn devolved upon Charlotte. The toys were still there; they always had
been there and always would be there, and when the nursery door was
fast shut there were no Kings or Queens or First Estates in that small
Republic on the floor. Charlotte, to be sure, chin-tilted, at last an
owner of real estate, might patronize a little at times; but it was
tacitly understood that her "title" was only a drawing-room one.

Why does a coming bereavement project no thin faint voice, no shadow of