But poverty did not seem to have hurt lovely little Golden Glenalvan. She had a wealth of beauty, and a happy heart that made her seem like a gleam of sunshine in the home she brightened. She was a careless, willful child not yet sixteen. The plain, simple, blue gingham dress was worn quite short, yet, the beautiful, golden tresses fell to her waist in long, loose, childish ringlets. Free and careless as the birds, she roamed at will through the wild, neglected park and the green woods that lay around her ancestral home. The dwellers in Glenalvan Hall were divided into two families. In the best and most habitable part, John Glenalvan lived with his wife and family, consisting of two daughters and a son. In a few battered rooms in the tumble-down wing, John Glenalvan's father, an old and hoary-headed man, kept house with his pretty little granddaughter, Golden, and one old black servant called Dinah. We have digressed a little from Golden as she stands beside the lake, swinging her wide, straw hat by its blue ribbons. Let us return. The little maiden is communing with herself. Quite unconsciously she speaks her thoughts aloud: "Old Dinah says that Elinor and Clare will give a little party to-night in honor of their brother's wealthy friend, who is to come on a visit to him to-day. How I wish they would invite me. I should like to go." "Should you now, really?" said a slightly sarcastic voice close to her. She looked up, and saw her cousin, Elinor coming along the path toward her. Elinor Glenalvan was a tall and queenly beauty of the most pronounced brunette type. She had large, black eyes that sparkled like diamonds, and glossy, black hair braided into a coronet on the top of her haughty head. Her features were well-cut and regular, her skin a clear olive, her cheeks and lips were a rich, glowing crimson. She was twenty-one years old, and her sister Clare, who walked by her side, was nineteen. Clare Glenalvan was a weak, vain, pretty girl, but with no such decided claim to beauty as Elinor. Her hair and eyes were not as dark as her sister's, her cheeks and lips were less rosy. She had a mincing, affected air, but was considered stylish and elegant. Both girls were attired in the best their father could afford from his very limited income, and their little cousin's simple blue gingham looked plain indeed by contrast with their cool, polka-dotted lawns, and lace ruffles. Elinor carried a small basket on her arm. They had come to the lake for water-lilies to decorate the rooms for the party of which they had caught Golden talking aloud. The little girl blushed at her dilemma a moment, then she faced the occasion bravely. "I did not know that you could hear me, Elinor," she said, lifting her beautiful, frank, blue eyes to her cousin's face, "but it is true. I should like to come to your party. You have invited grandpa's old servant to come and help with the supper, and she will go. Why do you not ask grandpa and me?"