believed that I would permit any one to do as this one did. I was really more attracted to Walter, the other youth with whom we studied. We were the best of friends. One night he came to our door and asked me to come out on the veranda--an unusual request. “Come out and see the stars,” was all he said. Wonderingly I went out: it was a cold night, my teeth chattered. We walked to the west end of the veranda and stood in silence for a little looking at the stars. I remember how Orion shone; we spoke but little, but I recall how his voice trembled; I did not understand it, but it moved me. It was such a little thing, and perhaps I make more of it than there was, but there seemed something in his impulsive request and the silent contemplation of the stars that was electrical--youth and propinquity, I suppose. Nothing came of it. I think at the time I was undoubtedly more attracted to him than he to me, but I don’t believe he ever dreamed of it. In fact, the boys and girls were wont to look upon me as a little aloof from them. The sweetheart of this same youth said to me one Monday morning: “Genie, when I see you in church Sunday nights, you seem so far away; your face looks so serious, and as though I would never dare speak to you; but when I see you in school and hear you laugh and talk you seem like one of us.” Most of the girls had had their beaux who had sent them valentines and bestowed upon them juvenile gifts, but my experience in this field had been very meagre. When a child, before I had learned to write, I remember being pleased with a little boy who drew me home on his sled, and once I printed him a note. I hardly think I ever intended giving it to him, but I tucked it under the zinc of our sitting-room stove and my sister found and read it. The mortification I endured hearing her repeat it cured me. I so hated after that to hear “Freddie boy’s” name mentioned that I was glad when he moved out of town. I recall no other sentimental affairs till I was perhaps fifteen or sixteen, when one of the academy boys and I had a clandestine correspondence. He liked a lot of the girls, was very popular, and wrote to several of them; they used to brag about it and show their notes, but I told no one that he wrote to me. The notes were usually trivial affairs, questions as to where the grammar lesson was, and the like, although there were a few I blush to remember. I was quite infatuated for a time; he was the hero of my daydreams, but far more interested in another girl than in me; he doubtless had no inkling of what was passing in the mind of his prim little school-mate. Some time after this, when we were discussing our futures, he told me of his intention of being a minister. I remember his earnest voice and shining eyes as he spoke of our anticipated careers, and said that we ought to do a great deal of good in the world. When, later than this, Walter, the youth of whom I have spoken,