the sixth and
seventh year presents are taken from their places of safekeeping,
kissed and fondled as expressions of love for the absent giver." This
is very beautiful and, doubtless, very true, but at the presumable age
of the reader--anywhere from eighteen to eighty--one would kiss a
miniature rather than a bird's nest or an apple, however rosy the
latter may have been last winter.

Miniatures, flowers, handkerchiefs, gloves and ribbons, then, ever
have been the favorite love tokens. We in the America of to-day are
inclined to substitute houses and lots or steam yachts. But this is a
temporary error. In time we will return to the glove, which means the
same as the honestly outstretched or lovingly clasping hand; and to
the flowers, the significance of each of which was perfectly
understood by the old time Greek and Roman, himself gathering the
chaplet that was to grace his sweetheart's brow. Better a thousand
times than the wretched watch chains of hair worn by our fathers would
be the embroidered handkerchiefs tucked triumphantly in their hats by
the gallants of Elizabeth's day. That, to be sure, was a bit
flamboyantly boastful; to exhibit a love token is as criminal as to
boast of a kiss. The actor-lover is alone in clamoring for the
calcium.

In this secrecy, so essential to the love token, our writers of
romance have found salvation. Even Fielding, to whom we owe the birth
of the English novel, could not overlook it--although we are almost
asleep when we reach the point where _Billy Booth_, about to depart,
is presented by _Amelia_ with a collection of trinkets packed in a
casket worked by her own fair hands. It wasn't the least bit like it,
was it?

The fact is, we must turn to France for the real thing, and to whom
more satisfyingly than to Dumas and his reckless musketeers, each of
whom, as well as the author, dwelt in "a careless paradise," and
constantly at hand had some reminder of her who, for the moment, was
the one woman on earth. We scarcely have a bowing acquaintance with
these three worthies before the valiant _D'Artagnan_ makes the almost
fatal but well-intentioned mistake of calling the attention of
_Aramis_ to the fact that he has stepped upon a handkerchief--a
handkerchief _Aramis_, in fact, has covered with his foot to conceal
from a crowd of roisterers; a love token from _Mme. de Bois-Tracy_--a
dainty affair, all richly embroidered, and with a coronet in one
corner.

Again, surely you are