y
heart is so full. Now can you tell me who may my lover
be?"

"I hope, Jennie," and the sister's eyes showed a blending
of severity and sorrow, "that it is not Alexander."

"It is Alexander. Why should it not be? Is he not handsome,
and gentle, and good? Wherefore then not he?"

"My God, do you know what such an alliance would cost
you, would cost us all? Marriage with a half-breed would
be a degradation; and a stain upon the whole family that
never could be wiped out. O my poor unfortunate sister,
ruin is what such a marriage would mean. Just that, my
darling sister, and no less."

"I care not for that. I love him with all my heart and
soul, and pledged myself to-night a hundred times to be
his. I never can love another man; and he only shall
possess me. What care I for the degradation of which you
speak, as measured against the crowning misery, or the
supreme happiness of my life? No; when Alexander is ready
to say to me, Come, I shall go to him, and no threat nor
persuasion shall dissuade me."

She spoke like all the heroic girls who afterwards meekly
untie their bonnets just as they were ready to go to the
church to wed against their keeper's will; and then sit
down awaiting orders as to whom they must marry. Jennie
was not the only girl who, in the first flush of passion,
is prepared to go through fire, or die at the stake for
the man she loves. Withal,--but that the proprieties
forbid it--whenever young women make these dramatic
declarations, the most appropriate course would be to
give them a sound spanking, and put an end to the tragic
business.

Nellie thought it her duty, and I suppose it was, to tell
her bear-like guardian what had befallen to her sister.
He was less disturbed on hearing the intelligence than
Nellie supposed, and merely expressed some cold-blooded
surprise at the presumption of the half-breed. He sat
at his desk, and taking a sheet of paper, wrote this
letter:

"To Alexander Saunders:

"DEAR SIR,--Would you be good enough to call at my house
this evening at eight o'clock?

"Yours truly,

"Thomas Brown."

Having sealed and dispatched this note he resumed his
work, without showing or feeling any further concern
about the matter. When it was growing dark over the
prairie that evening, the love-lorn Jennie saw her
pleading-eyed lover pass along in the shadow of the
poplars toward her guardian's house. She heard his ring
at the door, and his step in the hall. Her heart was