'Niram and Ev'leen Ann were standing up to be married. They looked very stiff and self-conscious, and Ev'leen Ann was very pale. 'Niram's big hands, bent in the crook of a man who handles tools, hung down by his new black trousers. Ev'leen Ann's strong fingers stood out stiffly from one another. They looked hard at the minister and repeated after him in low and meaningless tones the solemn and touching words of the marriage service. Back of them stood the wedding company, in freshly washed and ironed white dresses, new straw hats, and black suits smelling of camphor. In the background, among the other elders, stood Paul and Horace and I--my husband and I hand in hand; Horace twiddling the black ribbon which holds his watch, and looking bored. Through the open windows into the stuffiness of the best room came an echo of the deep organ note of midsummer. "Whom God hath joined together--" said the minister, and the epitome of humanity which filled the room held its breath--the old with a wonder upon their life-scarred faces, the young half frightened to feel the stir of the great wings soaring so near them. Then it was all over. 'Niram and Ev'leen Ann were married, and the rest of us were bustling about to serve the hot biscuit and coffee and chicken salad, and to dish up the ice-cream. Afterward there were no citified refinements of cramming rice down the necks of the departing pair or tying placards to the carriage in which they went away. Some of the men went out to the barn and hitched up for 'Niram, and we all went down to the gate to see them drive off. They might have been going for one of their Sunday afternoon "buggy-rides" except for the wet eyes of the foolish women and girls who stood waving their hands in answer to the flutter of Ev'leen Ann's handkerchief as the carriage went down the hill. We had nothing to say to one another after they left, and began soberly to disperse to our respective vehicles. But as I was getting into our car a new thought suddenly struck me. "Why," I cried, "I never thought of it before! However in the world did old Mrs. Purdon know about Ev'leen Ann--that night?" Horace was pulling at the door, which was badly adjusted and shut hard. He closed it with a vicious slam. "_I_ told her," he said crossly. A SAINT'S HOURS In the still cold before the sun HER LAUDS Her brothers and her sisters small She woke, and washed and dressed each one. And through the morning hours all, PRIME Singing above her broom, she stood And swept the house from hall to hall. At noon she ran with tidings good TERCE Across the field and down the lane To share them with the neighborhood. Four miles she walked and home again, SEXT To sit through half the afternoon And hear a feeble crone complain;