ople of great kingdoms smile. One of these things
was what is called the "Golden Age."

There was not a peasant in the villages, nor a citizen in the cities,
who did not believe in the Golden Age. If they happened to hear of
anything great that had been done in former times, they would say,
"That was in the Golden Age." If anybody spoke to them of a good thing
he was looking for in years to come, they would say, "Then shall be the
Golden Age." And if they should be speaking of something happy or good
which was going on under their eyes, they always said, "Yes, the Golden
Age is there."

Now, words like these do not come to people in a day. And these words
about the Golden Age did not come to the people of that ancient kingdom
in a day. More than a hundred years before, there was reigning over
the kingdom a very wise king, whose name was Pakronus. And to him one
day came the thought, and grew from little to more in his mind, that
some time or other there must have been, and some time or other there
would be again, for his people and for all people a "Golden Age."

"Other ages," he said, "are silver, or brass, or iron; but one is a
Golden Age." And I suppose he was thinking of that Age when he gave
names to his three sons, for he called them YESTERGOLD, GOLDENDAY, and
GOLDMORROW. Sometimes when he talked about them, he would say, "They
are my three captains of the Golden Age." He had also a little
daughter whom he greatly loved. Her name was FAITH.

These children were very good. And they were clever as well as good.
But like all the children of that old time, they remained children
longer than the children of now-a-days. It was many years before their
school days came to an end, and when they ended they did not altogether
cease to be children. They had simple thoughts and simple ways, just
like the people of the kingdom. Their father used to take them up and
down through the country, to make them acquainted with the lives of the
people. "You shall some day be called to high and difficult tasks in
the kingdom," he said to them, "and you should prepare yourselves all
you can." Almost every day he set their minds a-thinking, how the
lives of the people could be made happier, and hardly a day passed on
which he did not say to them, that people would be happier the nearer
they got to the Golden Age. In this way the children came early to the
thought that, one way or other, happiness would come into the wo