"You mean that I've got to pay as I go, or Providence will keep books
on me and foreclose?" asked John, as he stood patting the roll of
bills in his trousers pocket.

"That's the idea, son," smiled the elder man.

The younger man put his hand to his chin and grinned. "I suppose," he
replied, "that's why so many men keep the title to their religious
proclivities in their wife's name." He went out gayly, and the elder
man heard the boyish limp almost tripping down the stairs. Ward walked
to the window, straightening his white tie, and stood looking into the
street at the young man shaking hands and bowing and raising his hat
as he went. Ward's hair was graying at the temples, and his thin
smooth face was that of a man who spends many hours considering many
things, and he sighed as he saw John turn a corner and disappear.

"No, Lucy, that's not it exactly," said the general that afternoon, as
he brought the sprinkler full of water to the flower bed for the
eighth time, and picketed little Harriet Beecher Ward out of the
watermelon patch, and wheeled the baby's buggy to the four-o'clocks,
where Mrs. Ward was working. "It isn't that he is conceited--the boy
isn't that at all. He just seems to have too little faith in God and
too much in the ability of John Barclay. He thinks he can beat the
game--can take out more happiness for himself than he puts in for
others."

The wife looked up and put back her sunbonnet as she said, "Yes, I
believe his mother thinks something of the kind."

One of the things that surprised John when he came home from the