rs,
these two hardy friends faced each other over the rough table.

"Check!" said Pete, after the game had continued for over an hour.

Alec ran his fingers through his long hair, and shuffled uneasily on
his stool before making his move.

"Check!" again calmly remarked Pete, and a triumphant light gleamed in
his eye.

"You've the cinch on me this time for sure, mon," exclaimed Alec, as he
struggled to free himself from the clever trap.

"Mate!" once more ejaculated Pete, swinging up his queen, and
completely surrounding his opponent's king.

"Noo for anither," said Alec. "I'm no willin' to stop yet."

But Pete pushed back the chess board, and began to place the men into
the box. One by one he lifted them tenderly from the table, and when
the last had been safely deposited, he rose to his feet, and standing
with his back to the fire, faced his companions. This was his favorite
attitude when he wished to express himself most freely. He glanced
around the room with a feeling of pride, as a commanding officer might
look upon a little squad he was about to lead into action.

"B'ys," he began, cutting a chew from a plug of tobacco, "d'yez know
what night this is?"

The men looked up, but said nothing. There was no need for any reply.
They knew him well. It was only Pete's manner of beginning something
he wished to say. On this occasion, however, they detected a new note
in his voice, and a yearning, far-away expression in his eyes, as he
stood before them.

"It's Christmas Eve," he continued, rolling the wad of tobacco in his
cheek, "an' this is the seventh we've met together. Somehow I feel
it'll be the last, fer mighty changes are about to take place.
There'll be so many of them green-eyed gold grabbers in here that our
job'll be gone. They'll snook into every corner, an' what'll be left
fer us? I ain't as young as I uster be, and mebbe--oh, well, it's no
use lookin' too fer ahead, but any way I'd like this Christmas Eve to
be sorter special, jist to remind me of old times.

"Sixty an' five years, remember, have rolled over this gray head of
mine, an' the older I git, the stronger some things come back. When I
think of the time when my father an' mother, God bless 'em, uster take
me with'm to the leetle parish church way back in New Brunswick, a lump
comes inter my throat, an' a feelin' creeps over me that I can't jist
describe. I'd give all I possess to be thar agin, lads, dressed in my
leetle wh