nd
never know what it was to miss each other!"

Although we are jointly and severally aware that the years have been
slipping away, and that our turns to bid farewell to this dear earth
may come any day now despite the fact that we feel young as ever, we
choose still to regard death as a shy visitor which is likely to prefer
others to us. I say to myself that people rarely die of rheumatism,
which is Josephine's only cross, and though pneumonia is a fell
destroyer, I know that Josephine is firmly convinced that the colds to
which I am subject never attack my lungs. Some day one of us will wake
up and miss the other, unless my darling's prayer that we be taken away
together be granted; but until we do, are we not happier for cherishing
the delusion that we are to be overlooked indefinitely?

Was it a delusion, too, which made my darling, as I helped her into our
top-buggy on the morning of our twenty-fifth anniversary, seem to me no
less beautiful than on the day when we plighted our troth at the altar?
Did she not wear the same sweet, trusting smile, the same noble look in
her dear eyes? I told her so, and she informed me that I was demented,
but I know she knew that I thought she had not changed, which I am sure
was enough for her even if Providence has dimmed my eyes. Yet I
maintain that I am right. She is a little stouter, of course; I can
see a wrinkle and a crow's foot here and there; and her hair is
grizzled. But to all intents and purposes she does not look a day
older.

It was a glorious morning; one of those mild, mellow days of the late
autumn, when unscientific people wag their heads and proclaim that the
climate is changing. There was scarcely a breath of wind, and the
landscape toward which our steady nag trotted sturdily wore a faint
atmosphere of saffron haze, as though the sunlight had been steeped in
the lees of the yellow foliage. And the day we were married there was
a driving snowstorm! Josephine had predicted so confidently that
history would repeat itself on our anniversary, that I think she was
rather disappointed when she awoke to find the sun shining and all the
elements at rest.

Our Pegasus scarcely needed the guidance of the reins. He knew where
we were going, and sped along with our comfortable if old-fashioned
top-buggy at a stylish yet self-respecting gait in keeping with the
dignity of the occasion. Our first destination was the attractive home
of our daughter Winona, who