you all happiness in the future,
believe me to be

"Very sincerely and affectionately yours."

[Sidenote: On the Firing Line]

The dainty and appropriate wedding gift is not often shown to the happy
man, but every page and every line is carefully read. Now and then the
bride-elect advances boldly to the firing line and writes a letter of
thanks after this fashion:

"It is very sweet and thoughtful of you, my dear friend, to send me the
letters. Of course I shall keep them in with mine, though I have but
few, for the dear boy has never been able to leave me for more than a
day, since first we met.

"Long before we became engaged, he made me a present of your letters to
him, which he said were well worth the reading, and indeed, I have
found them so. I shall arrange them according to date and sequence,
though I observe that you have written much more often than he--I
suppose because we foolish women can never say all we want to in one
letter and are compelled to add postscripts, sometimes days apart.

"Believe me, I fully appreciate your wishes for our happiness. I trust
you may come to us often and see how your hopes are fulfilled. With many
thanks for your loving thought of me, as ever,

Affectionately yours."

[Sidenote: If a Girl is in Love]

If a girl is in love, she carries the last letter inside her shirt-waist
in the day time, and puts it under her pillow at night, thereby
expecting dreams of the beloved.

But the dispenser of nocturnal visions delights in joking, and though
impalpable arms may seem to surround the sleeping spinster and a tender
kiss may be imprinted upon her lips, it is not once in seventeen days
that the caresses are bestowed by the writer of the letter. It is a
politician whose distorted picture has appeared in the evening paper,
some man the girl despises, the postman, or worse yet, the tramp who has
begged bread at the door.

[Sidenote: When a Man is in Love]

When a man is in love, he carries the girl's last letter in his pocket
until he has answered it and has another to take its place. He stoops to
no such superstition as placing it under his pillow. Neither is it read
as often as his letters to her.

A woman never really writes to the man she loves. She simply records her
fleeting moods--her caprice, her tenderness, and her dreams. Because of
this, she is often misunderstood. If the letter of to-day is different
from that of yesterday, her lover, in his heart at least, ac