en _Nydia_ would have welcomed
renewed blindness in exchange for one glimpse of _Glaucus_, or of some
token of his care, men and women have cherished the gifts of those
they loved. True, not all have valued them, nor have all had the power
so to do. The beautiful Valois, quivering beneath the brand of the
red-hot iron because of her madness for the cold, white diamond, knew
nothing of the secret bliss in possessing purely as a token of love
either a diamond or a rose. Nor did Maria Louisa, leaving her
Jove-like husband to his fate, and escaping to Vienna with the crown's
most costly jewels. Nor, I am afraid, did the majority of the American
women competing in the attempt to eclipse royalty itself in their
display of gems at the coronation of King Edward.

There have been others, too, that knew nothing of the love
token--others whose ignorance of it was less deserving of censure.
None was exchanged by Dante and Beatrice, even though from their first
meeting, as he has told, "love lorded it over my soul!" Nor do I
recall that any passed between Petrarch and Laura, even though at her
death he wrote that "there is nothing more left me to live for"! But
these were examples of the super-ideal love, such as is seldom known
on earth, and such as, doubtless, would be unsatisfying to you or to
me. We of a generation that demands, above all, the tangible in
everything, whether financial or flirtatious, of the heart or of the
stomach--we must have, must we not, real kisses, warm from the mouth,
and actual love tokens, freely offered by or passionately pleaded from
the hand of her we love?

In this we are far from original--although, as I hope to show, men, at
least, are to-day more influenced by such keepsakes than ever before
in the history of the world. The great majority of the human race,
from peasant girls to empresses, and from shepherd lads to omnipotent
tyrants, have known, to some extent, the sadness and the joy of the
love token. The ballad that the lover-poet addressed to one who was
"just a porcelain trifle, just a thing of puffs and patches," but who
was, just the same, his adored--the ballad love token pleased even
that unemotional doll. "And you kept it and you read it, _belle
Marquise_!" Silly or supreme, all are vulnerable.

Therefore it is with no lack of authority that you learn that the
human race has known it for some centuries--this love token. It took
the form of birds among the ancient Greeks, although as