"I didn't do it all, Olive did half," cried Mr. Congreve the first chance he had of making himself heard above the babel of admiration and gratitude; whereupon Olive put in a hasty denial. She hadn't done a thing but come over and arrange. Everything was from Uncle Ridley except the silver vase and bracket, between the windows. "Well, you've seen it now, that'll do. I was invited here to breakfast, and I'd like to have it," cried the old gentleman, in a testy voice, which the good-natured gleam in his sharp eyes denied. So everybody pranced into the dining-room, and Bea was placed behind the coffee-urn, and couldn't do a thing but blush, and look too happy and overcome to attend to her duties. Perfect silence fell, as the young husband lifted his hand, and in a voice that trembled slightly, asked the minister to request a blessing on this, the first meal in the new home. But when that was done, everybody broke into a babel of fun again, and a merrier meal was never witnessed anywhere. "I shall come over and call on you this afternoon, Mrs. Barnett," was Kat's good-bye, when good-bye moment came. "Everything is lovely; may you live long, and always be thus gay," said Kittie, who began to feel a queer sensation in her throat, and wanted to get off in a hurry. "I don't know what to say, except that I want you to be so happy, Bea dear," Ernestine said, giving a good-bye kiss lingeringly. "Well, I think weddings are splendid, though I wish you wasn't going to have a new home, Bea," remarked Jean with regret, as she tied on her hat, and shook hands with her new brother. "I shall miss you dreadfully, and our room will seem so lonely," was Olive's next remark. "But you must not let us be apart much." "I will not," said Bea with full heart and eyes. "I will never love you any less, and we will all be just the same, except that you'll have a brother, and you know you've always wanted one." "I hope you'll be happy, dear child, I do indeed," said Mr. Congreve, with an exhaustive hand shake. "But married life is full of swampy places, and you must both be careful. I've only one piece of advice, and that is, whatever you do, don't let your confidence and trust in each other get a shake, for it is the tree of married life, and one shake will knock off more apples of love and happiness than can ever be replaced." "God bless you both," said Mrs. Dering, with one hand in that of her daughter, the other in that of her new son. "I give her to you freely, Walter, with perfect faith in your love and loyalty, and a dear daughter is the most precious gift a mother ever yielded up. Be worthy of each other's perfect love and trust, and once more, God bless you. Good-bye." To hear, to heed, to wed, Fair lot that maidens choose; Thy mother's tenderest words are said, Thy face no more she views. Thy mother's lot, my dear, She doth in nought accuse; Her lot to bear, to nurse, to rear, To love--and then to lose.