past the great entrance gate to admire the long
rows of stately old trees, and the great stone house at the end, whose
pillars gleamed white through the Virginia creeper that nearly covered
it.

Everybody knew old Colonel Lloyd, too, the owner of the place. He also
was often pointed out to the summer visitors. Some people called
attention to him because he was an old Confederate soldier who had given
his good right arm to the cause he loved, some because they thought he
resembled Napoleon, and others because they had some amusing tale to
tell of the eccentric things he had said or done.

Nearly every one who pointed out the imposing figure, which was clad
always in white duck or linen in the summer, and wrapped in a
picturesque military cape in winter, added the remark: "And he is the
Little Colonel's grandfather." To be the grandfather of such an
attractive little bunch of mischief as Lloyd Sherman was when she first
came to the Valley was a distinction of which any man might well be
proud, and Colonel Lloyd _was_ proud of it. He was proud of the fact
that she had inherited his lordly manner, his hot temper, and imperious
ways. It pleased him that people had given her his title of Colonel on
account of the resemblance to himself. She had outgrown it somewhat
since she had first been nicknamed the Little Colonel. Then she was
only a spoiled baby of five; but now his pride in her was even greater,
since she had grown into a womanly little maid of eleven. He was proud
of her delicate, flower-like beauty, of her dainty ways, and all her
little schoolgirl accomplishments.

"She is like those who have gone before," he used to say to himself
sometimes, pacing slowly back and forth under the locusts; and the
bloom-tipped branches above would nod to each other as if they
understood. "Yes-s, yes-s," they whispered in the soft lisping language
of the leaves, "_we_ know! She's like Amanthis,--sweet-souled and
starry-eyed; we were here when you brought her home, a bride. She's like
Amanthis! Like Amanthis!"

Under the blossoms rode the Little Colonel, all in white herself this
May morning, except the little Napoleon hat of black velvet, set
jauntily over her short light hair. Into the cockade she had stuck a
spray of locust blossoms, and as she rode slowly along she fastened a
bunch of them behind each ear of her pony, whose coat was as soft and
black as the velvet of her hat. "Tarbaby" she called him, partly because
he was s