s.

Now that I think of it, Willie Sears has been to see Fanny every
evening for the last week. I wonder whether Alice has noticed it; I
think I shall have to speak to her about it. Yet the probability is
that Alice will resent the suggestion which my mention of the matter
will convey. Alice has been saying all along that one particular
reason why our new house should be a large one is that there would then
be a room where Fanny could receive her company without being mortified
almost to death by Erasmus' horrid intrusion and still more horrid
remarks. At such times I forgive and adore Erasmus. It seems only
yesterday that I bought her a bisque doll at the World's Fair, a bisque
doll with pink eyes and blue hair, and now--oh, Fanny, are you no
longer our little girl?

Still, we have Josephine, and I am sure she will honor us; for she was
born six years ago under the conjunction of Jupiter and Venus, and
while Mars was at perihelion. Moreover, she is the seventh daughter of
a seventh daughter, and there are those who believe that there is
especial virtue in that. I named her after the French empress, not
because I am a particular admirer of that remarkable but unfortunate
woman's character, but for the reason that upon one occasion she
secured a pension of eight hundred francs for the astronomer LeBanc,
who had already added to the sum of human happiness by locating an
asteroid near the left limb of the sun, and who subsequently discovered
a greenish yellow spot on the outer ring of the planet Saturn. I never
hear my dear little girl's voice or see her sweet face that I do not
think of the planet Saturn; and never in the solemn stillness of night
do I contemplate the scintillating glories of the ringed orb without
being reminded of the fair, innocent babe asleep in her little white
iron bedstead downstairs.

This sentimental association of objects widely separated in space has
served to convince me that there is nothing, either in the heavens
above or in the earth beneath, that has not its use, both profitable
and pleasant.

III

WE MAKE OUR BARGAIN KNOWN

The Schmittheimer place has occasioned Alice and me many heartburnings
of envy the last three years. I recall that the first time we passed
it Alice exclaimed: "There, Reuben, is just the place for us!" I
agreed entirely with this proposition. The house stood back a goodly
distance from the street upon a prominence that gave it an extended
sur