They started home. He in moody silence and she, although
silent, was in a very gay mood, if one were to judge by her airy
movements.
When they reached the steps of the veranda he stopped, and
taking off his hat said: " Mabel, I have spent many pleasant hours
here this summer, but I think a trip lo Europe would do me good.
I will leave early to-morrow morning."
" Good bye."
" Good bye," she answered in a hearty, earnest voice: " give
my love to Marion."
'Way off in the land of all lands the best,
There's a village, the dearest of V,ast or of West,
Where the birds, the flowers, the poplar trees,
Are kissed by Aolus's tenderest breeze.
Where the sun, as he sinks from his overland flight,
heaves my ideal conception of midsummer night;
Aud the rarest wild flower that's wet by the dew
Is not purer or sweeter than her maidens true.
But of all these damsels, so charmingly fair,
There'a one "Airy Pairy " with golden hair,
Whose bewitching lips and whose laughing eyes
Seem designed to enchant and to tantalize.
* * *
I recall, even now, with a smile and sigh,
The pain of those cruel-sweet words, "Good-bye;"
And of all the world's pleasures I'd like to be mine,
I covet this flower—for my valentine.
ONE NEW YEAR'S AND ANOTHER.
" If all the year were holidays,"
The old bell on the tower of the county court house had barely
received the last stroke which announced the eighth hour of the
afternoon on the first day of the new year when Harry Bur
dette might have been seen to ascend the brownstone steps and
ring the door-bell of a handsome residence at No. 826 Delaware
avenue. Such movements on his part were the result of newly
The Free Lance
MY VALF,NTINE
[ P.V,BRUARY,
* •*
-H. H AL, '99