thought, in her matronly pearl-colored gown, with a dainty trifle of rich lace on her still abundant hair. He was very proud of his little mamma, and as devoted as a lover, "to keep his hand in against Phebe's return," she said laughingly, when he brought her a nosegay of blush-roses to light up her quiet costume.
A happier mother did not live than Mrs. Jessie, as she sat contentedly beside Sister Jane (who graced the frivolous scene in a serious black gown with a diadem of purple asters nodding above her severe brow), both watching their boys with the maternal conviction that no other parent could show such remarkable specimens as these. Each had done her best according to her light; and years of faithful care were now beginning to bear fruit in the promise of goodly men, so dear to the hearts of true mothers.
Mrs. Jessie watched her three tall sons with something like wonder; for Archie was a fine fellow, grave and rather stately, but full of the cordial courtesy and respect we see so little of now-a-days, and which is the sure sign of good home-training. "The cadets," as Will and Geordie called themselves, were there as gorgeous as you please; and the agonies they suffered that night with tight boots and stiff collars no pen can fitly tell. But only to one another did they confide these sufferings, in the rare moments of repose when they could stand on one aching foot with heads comfortably sunken inside the excruciating collars, which rasped their ears and made the lobes thereof a pleasing
