Yesterday I met her who first kindled in my bosom affection for woman--a widowed woman, withered and old. She smiled: the lingering trace of what it was, was all that was left. The little, plump hand was lean and bony, and wrinkles usurped the alabaster brow. Fifty years had made its mark. But memory was, by time, untouched. We parted. I closed my eyes, and there she was, in her girlhood's robes and her girlhood's beauty. The lip, the cheek, the glorious eye, were all in memory garnered still; and I loved that memory, but not the woman now. Another was in the niche she first cut in my heart, whose cheek and eye and pouting lip were young and lovely. Still these memories awoke out of this meeting, and, for hours, I forgot that I was wrinkled, old, and gray. I wonder how many's history I am writing now? The history of the heart, at last, is all the endearing history of waning life. Recur as we may to every success, to every sorrow, and they whisper a chapter of the heart. We struggle to make happy those we love. The gratifications of wealth, ambition, and feeling, all refer to the heart. There could be no pleasure from these memories if those we loved had not participated in them. We build a home for her we love, and those who sprout around us. We win wealth and a name for these, and but for them, all that is innate would be only alloy. They must reflect the bliss it brings, or it has no sweetness. Can there be a soul so sordid as to riot in pleasure and triumphs all alone--to shun companionship, and hate participation in the joys that come of successful life? I am in the midst of the scenes of my childhood, with here and there one friend left, who shared with me the school-hours, Saturday rambles, and sports of early boyhood. With these the memories come fresh and vigorous of the then occurring incidents--the fishings, the Saturday-night raccoon hunts, the forays upon orchards and melon-patches, and the rides to and from the old, country church on the Sabbath; the practical jokes of which I was so fond, and from which even my own father was not exempt. Kind reader, indulge the garrulity of age, and allow me to recount one of these. There are a few who will remember it; for they have laughed at it for fifty years. I never knew my father to tell a fib but upon one occasion in my life. Under the circumstances, I am sure the kindly nature will, at least, allow it to be a white one.