to sort out the
letters. A registered package from Stuart was the first thing that
Eugenia tore open, and the others looked up from their letters at her
pleased exclamation:

"Oh, it's the charms for the bride's cake!"

"Ornaments for the top?" asked Rob, as she lifted the layer of
jeweller's cotton and disclosed a small gold thimble, and a narrow
wedding-ring.

"No! Who ever heard of such a thing!" she laughed. "Haven't you heard of
the traditional charms that must be baked in a bride's cake? It is a
token of the fate one may expect who finds it in his slice of cake.
Eliot taught me the old rhyme:

"'Four tokens must the bridescake hold:
A silver shilling and a ring of gold,
A crystal charm good luck to symbol,
And for the spinster's hand a thimble.'

"Eliot firmly believes that the tokens are a prophecy, for years ago, at
her cousin's wedding in England, she got the spinster's thimble. The
girl who found the ring was married within the year, and the one who
found the shilling shortly came into an inheritance. True, it didn't
amount to much,--about five pounds,--but the coincidence firmly
convinced Eliot of the truth of the superstition. In this country people
usually take a dime instead of a shilling, but I told Stuart that I
wanted to follow the custom strictly to the letter. And look what a dear
he is! Here is a _bona fide_ English shilling, that he took the trouble
to get for me."

Phil took up the bit of silver she had placed beside the thimble and the
ring, and looked it over critically. "Well, I'll declare!" he exclaimed.
"That was Aunt Patricia's old shilling! I'd swear to it. See the way the
hole is punched, just between those two ugly old heads? And I remember
the dent just below the date. Looks as if some one had tried to bite it.
Aunt Patricia used to keep it in her treasure-box with her gold beads
and other keepsakes."

The old Colonel, who had once had a fad for collecting coins, and owned
a large assortment, held out his hand for it. Adjusting his glasses, he
examined it carefully. "Ah! Most interesting," he observed. "Coined in
the reign of 'Bloody Mary,' and bearing the heads of Queen Mary and King
Philip. You remember this shilling is mentioned in Butler's 'Hudibras:'

"'Still amorous and fond and billing,
Like Philip and Mary on a shilling.'

"You couldn't have a more appropriate token for your cake, my dear," he
said to