ne had done. There had been no one to help me attain
the desire--the innocent, just, and normal desire of my girlhood's
heart,--no one to lend a hand, till my heart had broken with slavery
and disappointment, and at less than thirty-five all that remained for
me was a little barren waiting for its feeble fluctuating pumping to
cease.

The girl presently fell asleep, so I covered her, kimono and all, and
extinguishing the light, lay down beside what had once been a tiny
baby, whose feeble life opening with the day had been nurtured on the
milk of old Ladybird, the spotted cow with a dew-lap and a crumpled
horn. She was now, I trusted, enjoying the reward of her earthly
labours in that best of heavens we love to picture for the dear
animals that have served us well, and but for whose presence the world
would be dreary indeed, while the sleep of her beautiful
foster-daughter had advanced to hold dreams of jewelled gowns,
thrilling solos, travel, and splendid young husbands who could do no
wrong, but she knew no room for thought of "Dora," who on the morrow
was to row her on the Noonoon. He might as well have relinquished the
chase, for his chances here had grown as faint as those of pretty Dora
Cowper--whose leg he classically stated he had pulled--had grown with
him.

Ah, well, there is a law of retribution in all things, direct or
indirect, visible or invisible.

I lay awake a long time contemplating the best way of approaching
Grandma Clay in regard to Dawn's singing lessons. One by one the
passenger trains streamed into Noonoon, halted a panting five minutes
at the station, then rumbled over the strange old iron-walled bridge,
slowed down again to the little siding of Kangaroo on the other side,
from whence up, up, the mountain-sides above the fertile valley,
leaving the peaceful agriculturists soundly asleep after their toil.
The heavy "goods" lumbered by unceasingly, the throbbing of their
great engines, their signalling, shunting, and tooting proving a
perennial delight to me, comforting me with the knowledge that I still
could feel a pulsation from the great population centres where my
fellows congregate.

It had lulled me to doziness, when I was aroused by the electric alarm
bell, the purpose of which was to warn folk when a train neared the
bridge. A very necessary device, as there was but one bridge for all
traffic, it being cut into two departments by three high iron walls
that shut out an exquisite view