"Not at this time of year, mother," interposed Diana. "Do you get up at these fearful times?" inquired Miss Masters languidly, turning her eyes full upon the latter speaker. Diana scarce answered. Would all the minutes of their visit pass in these platitudes? could nothing else be talked of? The next instant she blessed Mr. Masters. "Have you heard from the soldier lately?" he asked. "O yes! we hear frequently," Mrs. Reverdy said. "He likes his post?" "I really don't know," said her sister, laughing; "a soldier can't choose, you know; I fancy they have some rough times out there; but they manage to get a good deal of fun too. Evan's last letter told of buffalo hunting, and said they had some very good society too. You wouldn't expect it, on the outskirts of everything; but the officers' families are very pleasant. There are young ladies, sometimes; and every one is made a great deal of." "Where is Mr. Knowlton?" Diana asked. She had been working up her courage to dare the question; it was hazardous; she was afraid to trust her voice; but the daring of desperation was on her, and the words came out with sufficiently cool utterance. A keen observer might note a change in Mrs. Reverdy's look and tone. "O, he's in one of those dreadful posts out on the frontier; too near the Indians; but I suppose if there weren't Indians there wouldn't be forts, and they wouldn't want officers or soldiers to be in them," she added, looking at Mr. Masters, as if she had found a happy final cause for the existence of the aborigines of the country. "What is the name of the place?" Diana asked. "I declare I've forgotten. Fort----,I can't think of any name but Vancouver, and it isn't that. Gertrude, what _is_ the name of that place? Do you know, I can't tell whether it is in Arizona or Wisconsin!" And Mrs. Reverdy laughed at her geographical innocence. Gertrude "didn't remember." "He is not so far off as Vancouver, I think," said Mr. Masters. "No,--O no, not so far as that; but he might just as well. When you get to a certain distance, it don't signify whether it is more or less; you can't get at people, and they can't get at you. _You_ have seemed to be at that distance lately, Basil. What a dreadful name! How came you to be called such a name?" "Be thankful it is no worse," said the minister gravely. "I might have been called Lactantius." "Lactantius! Impossible. Was there ever a man named Lactantius?" "Certainly." "'Tain't any worse than Ichabod," remarked Mrs. Starling. "Nothing can be worse than Ichabod," said Mr. Masters in the same dry way. "It means, 'The glory is departed.'" "The Ichabods I knew, never had any glory to begin with," said Mrs. Starling.