ve each of
the boys a good-night kiss, "you will be 'really truly' knights if you
can live up to the motto you have chosen. Heaven help you to be always
as worthy of that title as you are to-night!"

Keith held her a moment, with both arms around her neck. "What does that
mean, auntie?" he asked. "That is what the professor said,
too,--Galahad."

"It is too late to explain to you to-night," she said, "but I will tell
you sometime soon, dear."

It was several days before she reminded them of that promise. Then she
called them into her room and told them the story of Sir Galahad, the
maiden knight, whose "strength was as the strength of ten because his
heart was pure." Then from a little morocco case, lined with purple
velvet, she took two pins that she had bought in the city that morning.
Each was a little white enamel flower with a tiny diamond in the centre,
like a drop of dew.

"You can't wear armour in these days," she said, as she fastened one on
the lapel of each boy's coat, "but this shall be the badge of your
knighthood,--'wearing the white flower of a blameless life.' The little
pins will help you to remember, maybe, and will remind you that you are
pledged to right the wrong wherever you find it, in little things as
well as great."

It was a very earnest talk that followed. The boys came out from her
room afterward, wearing the tiny white pins, and with a sweet
seriousness in their faces. A noble purpose had been born in their
hearts; but alas for chivalry! the first thing they did was to taunt
Virginia with the fact that she could never be a knight because she was
only a girl.

"I don't care," retorted Ginger, quickly. "I can be a--a--_patriot_,
anyhow, and that's lots better."

The boys laughed, and she flushed angrily.

"They ought to mean the same thing exactly in this day of the world,"
said Miss Allison, coming up in time to hear the dispute that followed.
"Virginia, you shall have a badge, too. Run into my room and bring me
that little jewelled flag on my cushion."

"I think that this is the very prettiest piece of jewelry you have,"
exclaimed Virginia, coming back with the pin. It was a little flag
whose red, white, and blue was made of tiny settings of garnets,
sapphires, and diamonds.

"You think that, because it is in the shape of a flag," said Miss
Allison, with an amused smile. "Well, it shall be yours. See how well it
can remind you of the boys' knightly motto. There is the white for