The age-herald., 1901-07-21
| .9Ne SvtAe Sad.
BY KATHERINE WALKER.

What gay, happy throng it was, for the Christmas cheer had entered the hearts of all.
 had a joyful ring that morning. and the eyes of the bluff Irish drivers were shin ing marrily out from under their shaggy eyebrows. In fact everybody, except one person, on that street was merry, and that person was Miss Temple, the best dressed and coziest among them.
 She was staring moodily at her boots. First she would gaze intently at them from one side and then the other. Evil dently they must have been very interest ing, even if they were fours.
 Now and then she would look up angri- ly when an especially loud nolse annoyed her. Not so the driver; his big, honest eyes were beauning affectionately at the whole crowd. Nothing worried him. Well, not exactly nothing for one thing did worry him, and that was the troubled expression on his mistress face, for she had been getting crosser and crosser for the last few days. What could be the matter?" he wondered vaguely. For years he had been one of the Temple homes inmates. He had driven Mrs. Temple and now he was driving Miss Temple. So, of course, everything per taining to the family interested him and he was allowed to assert his opinion in the kitchen.
 That morning while the lady of the house was idly looking out of one of the front windows she heard the rumble of wheels on the cobblestones and saw her own neat little phaeton turn the corner and stop directly below the window. The big, honest eyes of the driver looked up into hers as much as to say I've are ready She decided that she would go out, flor how horribly dismal 1t is in- doors, but she couldn't recall that she had ordered the phaeton that morning, but then James knew the time-honored custom of the household. Yes, 1t would be much better to get out Tn the air. and she went.
 Miss Temple was thinking over her life. Isn't it ridiculous that in books and stories we always know exactly what this and that man, and this and that woman thinks? But, oh, my. Anything to pass away timei
 Her girlhood days-how far away they seemed-had for the most part been spent in convent, but not even the high gloomy walls dampened her spirits and sometimes the sterm face of the mother superior relaxed while scolding her for some mischief. And her guardian-bless that dead mans heart-for she could do anything with him. How she did pity those poor girls whose letters from home were sprinkled with heartless little no, no, nos, as if the mother superior's were not sufficient. Mind you, mamma, deary," she would say, teasingly. She wondered long afterwards if 1t wouldn't have been better for her In the end if her guardian had sprinkled & few nos in her letters.
 When she left the convent at nineteen, how glorious the world seemed before her! She had been told that the old earth had become wicked and miserable, but to her it appeared the very oppo- site. It opened its arms to her and held her in it's chilly embrace for eight long years. She travelled, she danced, in fact, she did everything the world said do then she awoke to find she was doing nothing at all!
 She came back from foreign lands and settled in the home of her father That was five months ago, and here she was almost miserable. and yet one of the richest and most envied residents of Sumerville.
 The rode on and on, at last the streets becoming familiar. Before her for a mile