ries! And
it wouldn't be wrong, would it, to have out the horses between times
on Sunday and let these young things, who'd never had a chance, see
how glorious a feeling it is to ride a fine horse? Just around the
park, you know."

"Which would be quite as far as most of them would care to ride, I
fancy, for there are very few people who call their first experience
on horseback a 'glorious' one."

It was a busy week indeed, but a joyful one, full of anticipation
concerning the coming festivities. Never had the Sun Maid appeared
younger or gayer or entered more heartily into the preparations for
entertainment. A dozen times, maybe, during those mornings of shopping
and ordering and superintending, did she exclaim with fervor:

"Thank God for Gaspar's money, that makes us able to give others
pleasure!"

"Grandmother, even for a foreign nobleman you wouldn't do half so
much!"

"Foreign? No, indeed. To all their due; and to our own young
Americans, these toilers who are the glory of our nation, let every
deference be paid. Did you write about the orchestra? That was to play
during Saturday's supper?"

"Yes, indeed. I believe nothing is forgotten."

To the guests, who came at the appointed time, it certainly did not
seem so; and almost every one was there who had been asked.

"I did not believe that there could be found so many working girls in
Chicago who are just sixteen," cried the gay young hostess, standing
upon the great stair and looking down across the wide parlor, crowded
with bright, graceful figures.

"I did. My Chicago is a wonderful city, child. But I do not believe
that in any other city in the world could be gathered another such
assemblage. Typical American girls, every one. May God bless them!
Their beauty, their bearing, even their attire, would compare most
favorably with any company of young women who are far more richly
dowered by dollars. And the boys; even with their greater shyness, how
did they ever learn to be so courteous, so----"

"Oh, my Sun Maid! Answer yourself, in your own words. 'It's in the
air. It's just--Chicago!'"

When the fun was at the highest, there came a belated guest who
brought news that greatly disquieted the elder hostess, though none of
the merrymakers about her seemed to think it a matter half as
important as the next game on the list.

"A fire, broken out in the city? That is serious. The season is so dry
and there are many buildings in Chicago that would bur