ly rocking to and fro in a great chair by the
side of a large round table covered with books. There was a quiet beauty
in that placid face--that silvery hair brushed neatly under the snowy
border of the cap. Every line in that furrowed face told some tale of
sorrow long assuaged, and passions hushed to rest, as on the calm ocean
shore the golden-furrowed sand shows traces of storms and fluctuations
long past.

On the round, green-covered table beside her lay the quiet companion of
her age, the large Bible, whose pages, like the gates of the celestial
city, were not shut at all by day, a few old standard books, and the
pleasant, rippling knitting, whose dreamy, irresponsible monotony is the
best music of age.

A fair, girlish form was seated by the table; the dress bonnet had
fallen back on her shoulders, the soft cheeks were suffused and earnest,
the long lashes and the veiled eyes were eloquent of subdued feeling, as
she read aloud from the letter in her hand. It was from "our Harry," a
name to both of them comprising all that was dear and valued on earth,
for he was "the only son of his mother, and she a widow;" yet had he not
been always an only one; flower after flower on the tree of her life had
bloomed and died, and gradually, as waters cut off from many channels,
the streams of love had centred deeper in this last and only one.

And, in truth, Harry Sargeant was all that a mother might desire or be
proud of. Generous, high-minded, witty, and talented, and with a strong
and noble physical development, he seemed born to command the love of
women. The only trouble with him was, in common parlance, that he was
too clever a fellow; he was too social, too impressible, too versatile,
too attractive, and too much in demand for his own good. He always drew
company about him, as honey draws flies, and was indispensable every
where and to every body; and it needs a steady head and firm nerves for
such a one to escape ruin.

Harry's course in college, though brilliant in scholarship, had been
critical and perilous. He was a decided favorite with the faculty and
students; yet it required a great deal of hard winking and adroit
management on the part of his instructors to bring him through without
infringement of college laws and proprieties: not that he ever meant the
least harm in his life, but that some extra generous impulse, some
quixotic generosity, was always tumbling him, neck and heels, into
somebody's scrapes, an