Year: 1877

What a sigh was that not noisy, but
profound and eloquent at once of an
cid grief and a fresh perpleXity. Bob
Withcrs, the gentleman in his shirt
sleeves before the mirror, had heaved
that sigh every night for ten years, SIM
ultaneOusly with the act of removing
from his head the fine chestnut wig
which conceals the almost complete des-
tiluton of the natural covering. The
grief is therefore an old one, but an ele-
ment of perpleXity has mingled with
this nightly sigh more lately-since hay
ing wooed and won Angie McLane in
his wig, he has been screwing up his
courage to the point of revealing to her
that it is wig, Us he feels in fairness
he ought to. He has put it off, and put
it off, never finding just the right op-
portunity for the confession, until now
the wedding is but a month off, and the
task seems harder, more impossible,
than ever. He is at present spending a
couple of days at the house of the Nc
Lanes in the country, with view Of
getting acquainted with the family.


Meantime the process of getting ac-
qainted with the family does not get on
very prosperously. Bob is very poor
match from the parental point of view,
and bitter disappointment to the Nc
Lanes Nothing but Angles resolute
character could have eXtorted the grudg-
ing consent which their engagement had
at length received. The family con-
sisted, besides Angie, of her father and
mother and two brothers, John and
George. Mr.. McLane kept his room,
being confirmed invalid. John, strong
willed and arrogant in temper, ruled the
family with rod of iron-George being
kinder tempered, but of much less
strength of character Angie was the
only member of the family whom John
could not rule, and she had carried the
point of her engagement against his bit
ter opposition. Mrs. McLane was a mere
shuttlecock between John and Angie, re-
ceiving an impulse from one which
lasted till the other got hold Of her.
John had accepted the engagement with
an exceedingly bad grace, and made
scarcely decent pretense of conceal
ing from Bob his contempt and hostility,
and his desire to find any preteXt for
forcing % quarrel. This was particu-
larly unpleasant and demoralizing to
Bob, because the injury to his own self
respect by the sense of the tacit deceit
he was guilty of as to his wig left him
unable to meet Johns overbearing in
science with the quiet dignity he would
have liked to assume.


After going to bed he lay awake a
couple Of hours thinking over his en-
barrassing circumstances, when he sud
denly emembered that he had left his
sealing on the library table down
stairs.


Jumping out of bed he put on a part of
his clothes, and, softly opening the door
of the room, went across the hall and
down the stairs to the ground-hoor. 1t
was quite dark, but he found his way
easily, having good topographic in
stinct. From the lower hall he entered
the dining-room, and from that the
library. The sea-coal fire in the crate
was still hickering brightly, Illuminating
the sumptuously furnished room with a
faint, soft glow of peculiarly rich effect.


There on the table his ring glittered in
the litful freight, and, as he slipped it
on his finger, he felicitated himself on
his successful enterprise.


As he started to return, light-Stand
which he had easily avoided in coming
down, he now blundered fully upon.


Every body knows that when one stubs
the toe in the dark, instead of delivering
the blow when the foot is moving slow
est, at the beginning or end of the step,
it always happens so that the toe strikes
with the maximum momentum. SO it
was this time. If Bob had been kicking
football he could not have made a nicer
calculation of force, and the shock sent
the stand completely over.


1t would have made noise enough any
how, but it must happen that on this
stand the family silver was laid out for
breakfast, and the clangor was similar
to that of Apollo's silver bow, what
time he let fly at the Grecian host before
Troy.


His first rational idea was to bolt for
his room, and gain it before any one
was fairly reused. But the shock had
so scattered his wits that he could not
at once recollect his bearings, and he
realized with iudescribable sensations,