challenge to the hordes of Tyranny.

To Orchard Glen the first note of that call was a drum beat that came
throbbing over the hills one summer evening, a drum beat that started
in Old London.

Christina had gone up the back lane with the cows in the evening, to
see if the berries were ripe in the Slash.

The Back Hill was very silent and lovely in the evening. Far below her
lay her home fields; she could see John and Sandy hauling in their last
load of alfalfa, with Jimmie perched on the top. She opened the bars
into the back pasture and the stately herd trooped in, according to
precedence. Cherry stepped back meekly until Plum walked ahead, for
the cows were all well bred and knew their place. And Plum's place was
always at the head. She strolled in like some splendid duchess, her
meeker sisters dropping behind. Christina laughed as she put up the
bars. She always called Plum Mrs. Sutherland. She wondered if Wallace
would be staying all Summer in Orchard Glen. She was thinking so much
about him that she did not see some one coming up the opposite slope
until a tall figure suddenly appeared on the other side of the fence.
"Good evening, Christine," said Gavin Grant.

"Good night, Gavin," called Christina. She was always just a little
bit flustered in Gavin's presence. She was half afraid that he cared
for her and just a little bit afraid that he did not care at all.

"How is your haying?" she asked pleasantly.

"Fine. I finished to-day. And I was just looking if these oats were
ready. If the rain holds off I'll cut them to-morrow."

"Did Auntie Janet help you?" asked Christina slyly.

Gavin's dark eyes twinkled. "No, she didn't, but I had to give in and
get Hughie Reid's boys to help me, or she would have. I'm afraid I
can't manage her alone."

Christina was wondering how many young men she knew on the farms about
would be so careful of three old women as Gavin was of his Aunts.
Tilly Holmes said that Mrs. Sutherland waited upon Wallace hand and
foot. But then one could not believe half the gossip Tilly repeated.

She pulled a plume of the flaming fire-weed, a bright monument to some
splendid forest monarch that had perished in the flames.

"I like this flower, even if it is only a weed," she said. Gavin
smiled sympathetically.

"I always like weeds best, but I daren't tell my Aunties that," he said.

He was much more at his ease here up on the hills, and he looked very
fine too, with t