" Even the short stroll, however, between Belle Meade's home and Laura's, was bound to bring Dave Darrin again into the unwished-for limelight.

Why should we be astonished at the warped, cold, unhappy, suspicious natures we see about us, when we reflect upon the number of unwished-for, unwelcomed children in the world;children who at best were never loved until they were seen and known, and were often grudged their being from the moment they began to be.

One does not live among these people day after day, pleading for a welcome for unwished-for babies, standing beside tiny graves, receiving pathetic confidences from wretched fathers and helpless mothers, without facing every problem of this workaday world; they cannot all be solved, even by the wisest of us; we can only seize the end of the skein nearest to our hand, and patiently endeavor to straighten the tangled threads.

There is no club-house, coffee-room, billiard-room, or theatre, to slip into; and if caught in a shower you must content yourself with the arcades of Nature, beneath which you enjoy the unwished-for luxury of a shower bath.

"Can you, will you forgive this unceremonious and, I fear, unwished-for intrusion?" was the young stranger's address to Grahame, when he had recovered from the agitation which Lilla's emotion had called forth, he scarcely knew wherefore.