being stocked with a view to the trade of city people; but our bank will defer payment of the same until we are in receipt of enclosed acknowledgment, duly signed before a notary public, of your acceptance under the terms of your uncle's will, a copy of which we enclose.

"How strange!" murmured Grace, who seemed to be in a brown study.

"Is that all it is?" asked Phil.

"No, you silly dear; you know it isn't. But you've scarcely ever mentioned your uncle to me; now it appears that you must have been very dear to him. I can't understand it."

"Can't, eh? That's somewhat uncomplimentary to me. I suppose the truth is that Uncle Jethro couldn't think of any one else to leave his money to; for he was a widower and childless. My dear dead-and-gone father was his only brother, and he had no sisters, so I'm the only remaining male member of the family."

"But what sort of man was he? Do tell me something about him."

"I wish I knew a lot of pleasant things to tell, but I know little of him except what I heard when I was a boy. Father, in whom family affection was very strong, loved him dearly, yet used to be greatly provoked by him at times; for uncle's only thought was of money—perhaps because he had nothing else to think of, and he wrote advice persistently, with the manner of an elder brother—a man whose advice should be taken as a command. When I started East I stopped off and tramped three miles across country to call on him, for the letter he wrote us when father died was a masterpiece of affection and appreciation. I had never seen him, and I'm ashamed to say, after what has just occurred, that after our first interview I had no desire to see him again. His greeting was fervent only in curiosity; he studied my face as if I were a possible customer who might not be entirely trustworthy. Then he made haste to tell me, with many details, that he was the principal merchant and business man in the county, where he had started thirty years before, with no capital but his muscles and wits. He intimated that if I cared to remain with him a few months on trial, and succeeded in impressing him favorably, I might in time earn an interest in his business; but I thought I had seen enough of country stores and country ways to last me for life; so I made the excuse that as my parents were dead and my sisters married, I felt justified in going to New York to continue my studies. When he asked me what I was studying, I was obliged to reply, 'Literature and art,' at which statement he sneered—I may say truthfully that he snorted—and at once became cooler than before; so I improved my first opportunity, between customers' visits, to say that it was time for me to be starting back to the railway station. In justice to myself, however, as well as to him, I could not start without telling him how greatly his letter about my father had affected me. For a moment he was silent: he looked thoughtful, and as tender, I suppose, as a burly, hard-natured man could look; then he said:—

"'Your father was one of the very elect, but—'

"I quickly interrupted with, 'I'm not very religious, but I won't listen to a word of criticism of one of the elect—least of all, of my father. Good by, uncle.' He made haste to say that the only two men of the Somerton family shouldn't part in anger; and when he learned that I had walked three miles through the darkness and November mud, and intended to walk back to the station, he told a man who seemed to be his clerk,—Caleb Wright, evidently the man mentioned in this extraordinary letter,—to get out some sort of conveyance and drive me over. While Caleb was at the stables, my uncle questioned me closely as to my capital and business prospects. I was not going to be outdone in personal pride, so I replied that, except for some mining stocks which some one had imposed upon my father, and were down to two cents per share, I'd exactly what he had told me he began with,—muscle and wits. He saw that I had no overcoat,—boys and young men in our part of the country seldom had them,—so he pressed one upon me, and when I tried to decline it, he said, 'For my dead brother's sake,' which broke me down. When I reached the train, I found in the overcoat pockets some handkerchiefs, gloves, hosiery, neckwear, and several kinds of patent medicines, which evidently he thought trustworthy; there was also a portemonnaie containing a few small notes and some coin. I wrote, thanking him, as soon as I found employment; but he never answered my letter, so I was obliged to assume that he had repented of his generosity and wished no further communication with me."

"How strange! But the man—Caleb—who drove you to the station, and who seems to be a life pensioner on the estate, and is to be dependent upon us,—how did he impress you?"

"I scarcely remember him, except as a small man with a small face, small beard, a small gentle voice, and pleasanter eyes than country clerks usually have. I remember that his manner seemed very kindly,—after my experience with my uncle's,—and he said a clever or quaint thing once in a while, as any other countryman might have done. For the rest, he is a Civil War veteran, and about forty years of age—perhaps less, for beards make men look older than they are."

"And the town with the odd name—Claybanks?"

"I saw it only in the dark, which means I didn't see it at all. I believe 'tis the county town, and probably it doesn't differ much from other Western villages of a thousand or two people. 'Twill be a frightful change from New York, dear girl, for you."

"You will be there," replied Grace, with a look that quickly brought her husband's arms around her. "And you will be prominent among men, instead of merely one man among a dozen in a great office. Every one will know my husband; he won't any longer go to and from business as unknown as any mere nobody, as you and most other men do in New York. 'Tis simply ridiculous—'tis unnatural, and entirely wrong, that my husband's many clever, splendid qualities aren't known and put to their proper uses. You ought to be the manager of the firm you are with, instead of a mere clerk. I want other people to understand you, and admire you, just as I do, but no one is any one in this great crowded, lonely, dreadful city."

"There, there!" said Philip. "Don't make me conceited. Besides, we've neglected that check for at least ten minutes. Let's have another look at it. A thousand dollars!—as much money as both of us have had to spend in a year, after paying our rent! A tenth part of it will be more than enough to take us and our belongings to Claybanks; with the other nine hundred we'll buy a lot of things with which to delight ourselves and astonish the natives,—silk dresses and other adornments for you, likewise a piano, to replace the one we have been hiring, and some pictures, and bric-à-brac, and we'll subscribe to a lot of magazines, and—"

"But suppose," said Grace, "that after reaching there you find the business difficult or unendurable, and wish to come back to New York?"

"Never fear for me! I'm concerned only for you, dear girl. I know Western country places, having been brought up in one; I know the people, and among them you will take place at once as a queen. But queens are not always the most contented of creatures. Their subjects may not be—"

"If my first and dearest subject remains happy,"