clasped mine as I had dreamed a moment ago it would, as if he would care
for me and guard me all through life.

And then--and then--Hope, dear, there isn't any more to tell. He died
there in my arms, and at first I could not believe it, but the doctor
took me away to my mother, and she was kind to me--yes, she was very
tender to me; but what can anyone do when all the happiness has gone out
of one's life. Then I began to grow old, dear, though I was not twenty,
and I have been growing old ever since.

Why, there 're tears in your eyes, child! Don't cry; I am old now and
some of the bitterness has gone. One doesn't understand why the good
Lord should let life be so bitter for some of us, but I suppose it
is for some good reason, only--only, you see it was another man's
wickedness spoiled my life. Yes, yes, I know there was foul play. Dick
Stanton rushed his horse down on Boatman like that, just to spoil his
chance of the race, and many there were who thought as I did; but who
could prove it? No, I don't think even now he meant to kill him.

But there--there is my story, Hope. It is many a long day since I told
it. You wanted to know why I am an old maid; you understand now, don't
you, dear. I couldn't have married anybody else, how could I? But don't
be an old maid, Hope, it is a dreary life--a lonely, hopeless life,
and--

Yes, I thought so. Willie Maclean coming up the path. What, blushing,
child, or is it my old eyes deceive me? Run away then and bring him
in here. I knew his father in the old days, before the Yanyilla
Steeplechase was lost and won.

A DIGGER'S CHRISTMAS

It was on the Tinpot Gully diggings, now known to fame by a far more
euphonious title, that early in the fifties I spent my first Christmas
in Australia. There were all sorts and conditions of men there, men
from every nation and every class. Englishmen and Italians, Russians and
Portuguese, Persians, Chinamen, and negroes, sons of peers and London
pickpockets, all rubbed shoulders on the Tinpot Gully diggings. But they
came naturally enough to me in those days. At one and twenty nothing
astonishes one, and I took things as I found them, and questioned not,
and barely wondered at the mixed company in which I found myself. Very
peaceful looked the scene as I stood at my tent door, or rather curtain,
and surveyed it thus early in the morning. All the camp was sleeping.
Most of the diggers had made a night of it the night before in
anticip