excellent idea. "We mustn't get old before our
time! We must keep brightness about the place. I have seen my mother
laugh and look all the gayer out of her beautiful black eyes when other
folk would have been weeping!--I hear company coming, now! It's Cousin
William, I think."

Cousin William it was, not gone to the war because of sixty-eight years
and a rich inheritance of gout. He came in, ruddy as an apple, ridden
over to cheer up the Greenwood folk and hear and tell news from the
front. He had sons there himself, and a letter which he would read for
the thirtieth time. When Judith had made him take the great armchair,
and Miss Lucy had rung for Julius and a glass of wine, and Unity had
trimmed the light, and Molly replenished the fire, he read, and as in
these days no one ever read anything perfunctorily, the reading was more
telling than an actor could have made it. In places Cousin William
himself and his hearers laughed, and in places reader and listener
brushed hand across eyes. "Your loving son," he read, and folded the
sheets carefully, for they were becoming a little worn. "Now, what's
your news, Lucy? Have you heard from Fauquier?"

"Yes, yesterday. He has reached Fredericksburg from Winchester. It is
one of his old, dry, charming letters, only--only a little hard to make
out in places, because he's not yet used to writing with his left hand."
Miss Lucy's face worked for a moment; then she smiled again, with a
certain high courage and sweetness, and taking the letter from her
work-basket read it to Cousin William. He listened, nodding his head at
intervals. "Yes, yes, to be sure, to be sure! You can't remember Uncle
Edward Churchill, Lucy, but I can. He used to read Swift to me, though I
didn't care for it much, except for Gulliver. Fauquier reminds me of him
often, except that Uncle Edward was bitter--though it wasn't because of
his empty sleeve; it was for other things.--Fredericksburg! There'll be
another terrible battle. And Warwick?"

"We heard from him to-day--a short letter, hurriedly written; but oh!
like Warwick--like Warwick!"

She read this, too. It was followed by a silence in the old Greenwood
library. Then said Cousin William softly, "It is worth while to get such
letters. There aren't many like Warwick Cary. He's the kind that proves
the future--shows it isn't just a noble dream. And Edward?"

"A letter three days ago, just after you were here the last time."

The room smiled. "It was w