Year: 1877




beat upon the rocks and almost washed
her feet.


The sun was going down in a mass of
lurid red clouds, the eastern breeze was
freshening along the bluffs, and now
and then a stray drop of rain fell on
her.


Geraldine Vane drew her shawl a.
round her, with an involuntary shiver.
Something there was in the night clos
| ing around which reminded her of a
dead day.


Her mind went back to the time with
a throb of pain. She would gladly
have avoided the retrospect-bu who
can control thought?
Eleven years ago she was sixteen.
What an old, old woman she must be
grown now She stretched out her
hand through the shadows and looked
at it earnestly, half expecting to see it
wrinked and wthered like old Grand
mother Hoit's, and she was upward of
ninety.


Eleven years ago she had walked
these very sands, just as golden now as
| then-just so the summer waves had
| broken their hearts in music on the
shore, lust so the salt sea breeze had
swept her cheek and tossed the white
fOam,caps over the sunken rock outside
the harbOr.


But then Thane Richmond was beside
her, and youth, and hope, and love,
were hers, to say nothing of tluSt
which was perfect. What more could
woman ask for?


| They were a pair of lovers just be.
trOthed, loving each other as no other
lovers had ever loved before-sO they
said and thought, and it was,very to
them, and wondrous sweet, as it always
is when the dream is new.


But, after all, there was some cause
! of sadress; and when would love be
love if there were not? Richmond was
TO leave her in week for China, to be
absent three years; for his fortune was
yet to make, and he was too proud lad
to accept wife whose pOssessi ms were
greater than his own. Geraldine was
an heiress, 80 it was out of question to
marry on nothing, and live on cheese
| parings and kisses in vine-wreathPd
cottage, as both the young people would
have Oeen glad to do.


Colonel Varley, Geraldne'S father,
was a high bred old fellow, and he had
said to audacious young .Thane Rich
mond, when he had asked him for his
daughter:


"See here, young man! money is the
thing needed nowadays, and my daugh-
ter has always worn her diamonds and
ridden IN her carriage. She must not
marry beneath her. When you can
come to me with a fortune sufficient to
support wife, and keep her in the
gewgaws that a woman finds necessary
now, Geraldine is yours that is, if
size has not changed her mind and mar
ried somebody with fortue ready
made


All of which was very cruel in the
unsympathetic parent, but the parents
of heroines have always been made of
stern stuff, you know.


So it was decreed that Thane Rich.
mond should 50 out and seek his for
tune among the Celestials, and Geral-
dine was to so to Paris and finish her
education.


But they were to write-so very often
= twice or thrice week, which Was
very moderate for lovers, and, beside
the sea, with the dim light of the stars
around them, one night in June, they
said their farewells and vowed to De
true.


The lonely woman sitting there to-
night on the shore, and going back over
the ways she had travelled, drew a sigh
something of the tenderdess of that
olden time fingered with her still, and
flushed her pale cheek with soft,
bright crimson.


But to return.


For two years after Thames depar.
ture hi, letters had been regular, and
they had satisfied the heart of the wo'
inan who had loved him, and not one
man in a bundled, be he never so loyaI
and tender, can write a letter OF love
which will just meet the requirements
OF loving wOman's nature without be-
ing silly.


At the end of this time the letter;
stopped. No word OF explanation
nothing to break the dull suspense
which is always so hard to bear.


Geraldine, proud though she was
wrote to Thane TO ask the cause Of hi,
strange silence. She received in return
few briet lines-he was weary OF a
youthful folly, asked her to forget him
. and volunteered the information tha
he was soon 70 be married to the
daughter OF an attache of the American
| legation at PekIn.


Q Well, such breaks as this are happen
ing ali the time around us; they aII
? common as births, and excite about a.
much attention. The world does no
suffer the anguish of heart which some
I times comes of them to people so unfor
! tunate as to be possessed of feelings
a and so the world wags on as ever.
: Geraldine was one of those wretchec
women who cannot transfer their atfec'
|. tlons as one would transfer a house ol
Z other piece Of property, and In eonse
! quences she suffered deeply
I Loving once with her was loving fol-
E all time, aud though she had suitors by
$ the score-as what beautiful and veal
thy woman has not ?-she turned from
b, them all in quiet cOldness.


After a while Colonel Varley took tn,
matter in hand. No daughter of hi
should pine her life away Tor a beggar