The Hudson on a warm summer afternoon. The " Mary
Powell " is slowly wending her way up the glassy surface.
Nothing to disturb the " even tenor of her way " save where here
and there a small boat, whose occupant has been rash enough to
brave the rays of the August sun, darts across her bow. On the
steamer's deck the passengers are scattered around under the
awnings, vainly striving to keep cool, and almost too much occu
pied with that to notice the beauties through which they are pass
ing. On the forward deck a couple of girls are noisily idling
away the moments in a feminine discussion on the usual topic—
man.
" Well, Bess, you can talk as you wish, but I certainly think
Mr. Lawler is very nice," exclaimed one of the young ladies in
an animated manner,
The young lady addressed laughed musically at the warmth of
her friend's harangue.
" Mary," she replied, " I am afraid that the brass buttons have
bewitched you, but you certainly don't expect an army girl like
me to fall down at the feet of every cadet I meet." .
For this fascinating girl, with her laughing blue eyes and
golden hair, was a product of the plains. Her father, Colonel
Alexander, commanding the —th Cavalry, at Port Logan, had
been left a widower when Bess was a little wee tot, and the loss of
the wife had made the daughter doubly clear. As the result she
had been brought up with her father and the regiment, every
man of which she knew by name, and to every man of which she
was endeared by a thousand little acts of kindness. Her educa
tion had been the best that Denver could give, but when she
reached the age of eighteen the Colonel recognized the fact that
she needed more girl companions and sent her Blast to enter Vas
sar. Her freshman year had passed pleasantly, and now we find
her spending her summer vacation with her cousin and classmate,
Mary Langton. The girls had been down at New York and
were returning to their home in Albany. That is how Bess
Alexander and Mary Langton happened to be on the deck of
a Hudson river steamer discussing " Jimmy " Lawler, as his
classmates called him, this summer afternoon.
" Now this same " Jimmy " Lawler, or, as the Military Acad-
The Free Lance.
MARS AND VENUS.
[DCII,IvIBItR ?