Perhaps little Jane Addams loved trees and people best of all. Trees were so big and true, with roots ever seeking a firmer hold on the good brown earth, and branches growing up and ever up, year by year, turning sunbeams into strength. And people she loved, because they had in them something of all kinds of life. There was one special tree that had the friendliest nooks where she could nestle and dream and plan plays as long as the summer afternoon. Perhaps one reason that Jane loved this tree was that it reminded her of her tall, splendid father. [Illustration: Jane Addams] "You are so big and beautiful, and yet you always have a place for a little girl--even one who can never be straight and strong," Jane whispered, as she put her arms about her tree friend. And when she crept into the shelter of her father's arms, she forgot her poor back, that made her carry her head weakly on one side when she longed to fling it back and look the world in the face squarely, exultingly, as her father's daughter should. "There is no one so fine or so noble as my father," Jane would say to herself as she saw him standing before his Bible-class on Sundays. Then her cheek paled, and her big eyes grew wistful. It would be too bad if people discovered that this frail child belonged to him. They would be surprised and pity him, and one must never pity Father. So it came about that, though it was her dearest joy to walk by his side clinging to his hand, she stepped over to her uncle, saying timidly, "May I walk with you, Uncle James?" This happened again and again, to the mild astonishment of the good uncle. At last a day came that made everything different. Jane, who had gone to town unexpectedly, chanced to meet her father coming out of a bank on the main street. Smiling gaily and raising his shining silk hat, he bowed low, as if he were greeting a princess; and as the shy child smiled back she knew that she had been a very foolish little girl indeed. Why of course! Her father made everything that belonged to him all right just because it _did_ belong. He had strength and power enough for them both. As she walked by his side after that, it seemed as if the big grasp of the hand that held hers enfolded all the little tremblings of her days. "What are these funny red and purple specks?" Jane asked once as she looked with loving admiration at the hand to which she clung. "Those marks show that I've dressed millstones in my time, just as this flat right thumb tells any one who happens to notice that I began life as a miller," said her father.