Dear one, dost think thou art alone in this Great overwhelming conflict of love’s might? Dost think thou art dependent, and my right Is subjugating thee? O sweet, the bliss Of marriage lies beyond such talk as this! True love is most dependent, and all right Is yours as mine, since our supreme delight Lies with each other; then let us not miss The joy of this full time by hint of war, Or agonize ourselves with distant fears,-- A truce to these misgivings! With such store Of love we’ll front our happiness, that years Will bring us compensations more and more. I master? nay, a beggar,--see these tears! JOHN ARMSTRONG. PARILEE’S DREAM. “Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?” Her husband turned on his pillow and looked at her. She was asleep, and the smiles that played over her features, now and again interrupted by a look of gentle sadness, showed that she was dreaming. He was about to wake her, but he hesitated to break in upon what he knew must be a very sweet vision, and, keeping his eyes upon her face, he awaited the end. They had been married two years. He had come suddenly into her life, taking her away from several admirers and out of a continuous round of pleasure and excitement, and after a short courtship they had wed. Parilee often said to herself: “How much better off I am,” and thought with satisfaction that instead of being a silly and superficial girl she was a wife, and at the head of a home. There had been hardly a discord in their lives since the day of their union; and Parilee believed she was quite happy. As she lay there, her lips moved in the words, “I love you,” and her face flushed so deeply that her husband, doubting his eyes, speculated as to whether she was really asleep. As the early light of the sun burst into the room, she started up, thinking, “What a dream for me!” At her old home she had wandered along by the creek which ran through her father’s fields. She had been in quest of something, but what that something was she did not know; there was a longing and a longing, very deep and sad. Suddenly she had seen Tom Harding coming toward her. Taking him by the hand, she had led him to a large rock near, and they had both sat down upon it. Then, in a trembling voice she had said: “Tom, I’ve been seeking you such a long time; I love you.” Looking at her searchingly and with tenderness, Tom had replied, oh, so softly; “You love me! I have long loved you, too”; and had taken her in his arms and kissed her. “What were you dreaming about?” her husband asked, as she stirred and opened her eyes; “I saw you smiling in your sleep.” She did not answer, but went over her dream again and again, recalling every minute detail. Sweeter sensations never lingered after a real kiss. She revelled in memory as she looked out on the morning sky and thought of Tom’s embrace. “Were you dreaming of me, Parilee?”