mall
children clustered round her.

"I have some English letters to write," she said; "and I think we'll go
in."

The Challoners did not leave for the West the next day. About an hour
before sunset they leaned upon the rails of a wooden gallery built out
from the rock on the summit of the green mountain that rises close
behind Montreal. It is a view-point that visitors frequent, and they
gazed with appreciation at the wide landscape. Wooded slopes led
steeply down to the stately college buildings of McGill and the rows of
picturesque houses along Sherbrook Avenue; lower yet, the city, shining
in the clear evening light, spread across the plain, dominated by its
cathedral dome and the towers of Notre Dame. Green squares with trees
in them checkered the blocks of buildings; along its skirts, where a
haze of smoke hung about the wharves, the great river gleamed in a
broad silver band. On the farther bank the plain ran on again, fading
from green to gray and purple, until it melted into the distance, and
the hills on the Vermont frontier cut, faintly blue, against the sky.

"How beautiful this world is!" Challoner exclaimed. "I have seen
grander sights, and there are more picturesque cities than
Montreal--I'm looking forward to showing you the work of the Moguls in
India--but happiness such as I've had of late casts a glamour over
everything. It wasn't always so with me; I've had my bad hours when I
was blind to beauty."

Though Blanche Challoner was very young, and much in love, she ventured
a smiling rebuke.

"You shouldn't wish to remember them; I'm afraid, Bertram, there's a
melancholy strain in you, and I don't mean to let you indulge in it.
Besides, how could you have had bad hours? You have been made much of,
and given everything you could wish for, since you were a boy. Indeed,
I sometimes wonder how you escaped from being spoiled."

"When I joined the army, I hated it; that sounds like high treason,
doesn't it? However, I got used to things, and made art my hobby
instead of my vocation. You won't mind if I confess that a view of
this kind makes me long to paint?"

"Oh, no; I intend to encourage you. You mustn't waste your talent.
When we stay among the Rockies we will spend the days in the most
beautiful places we can find, and I shall take my pleasure in watching
you at work. But didn't your fondness for sketching amuse the mess?"

"I used to be chaffed about it, but I repaid my tormentors b