clover nodded to her
as if to a queen.

Lily had said all she could. Her heart ached with unspeakable pity and
a sort of terror.

"Don't give up, Lucretia. This may be the worst hour of your life.
Live and bear with it all for Christ's sake--for your children's
sake. Sim told me to tell you he was to blame. If you will only see
that you are both to blame and yet neither to blame, then you can rise
above it. Try, dear!"

The wife pulled herself together, rose silently, and started toward
the house. Her face was rigid but no longer sullen. Lily followed her
slowly, wonderingly.

As she neared the kitchen door, she saw Sim still sitting at the
table; his face was unusually grave and soft. She saw him start and
shove back his chair,--saw Lucretia go to the stove and lift the
tea-pot, and heard her say, as she took her seat beside the baby,--

"Want some more tea?"

She had become a wife and mother again, but in what spirit the puzzled
girl could not say.

EDITORIAL NOTES.

AN EPOCH-MARKING DRAMA.

A movement destined, I think, to be in a degree epoch-marking in the
dramatic annals of the American stage, was inaugurated by Mr. James A.
Herne, on the fourth of May, in Boston, in the production of his
remarkable realistic drama, "Margaret Fleming," at Chickering Hall.
The play is a bold innovation, so much so that no theatre in the city
would produce it, although the various managers who examined it
declared it to be as strong as and no less powerful than any American
drama yet written. The character of the audience was as striking as
the play was brave and original. It was, indeed, a strange sight to
see such well-known and thoughtful men and women as Mr. William Dean
Howells, Rev. Minot J. Savage, Rabbi Solomon Schindler, Rev. Edward A.
Horton, Mrs. Louise Chandler Moulton, Hamlin Garland, and a score or
more of persons almost as well known in literary, religious, and
thoughtful circles, assembled on the first night of a dramatic
production. Nor was the character of the audience less remarkable
during the fortnight it was played. Men and women who are rarely seen
at theatres attended two, three, and even four performances. The
superb acting of Mr. and Mrs. Herne contributed much to the success of
the play; curiosity also doubtless attracted many, yet beyond and
above this was the deep appreciation of a thoughtful and intelligent
constituency, who saw in this drama the marvellous possibilities of
the sta