His strength seemed suddenly to desert him and he sank weakly on a chair, “How I loved him!  My God!” Then there flashed back to him the memory of his wife’s deep, true love, and sorrow for the lost one, and of how he had added to their sorrow, and how they were now about to separate, and the regret and pity of it all broke down all self-control and caused sobs to break from his lips, such as only strong men who seldom know what tears are, can ever utter.

When the storm had spent itself he rose and carefully wrapped up the boots.  “I will take them with me,” he said, “they will keep me from growing narrow and morose again.  Ah, if I had but kept them when I was passing through the dark days!  I should have had more sympathy with her, have understood myself and her better, and this never would have happened.”  He looked around the room for the last time:  “No, she never was so dear to me as she is to-night; I never understood her so well.”

As he was moving sadly toward the door some belated organ-grinder, in an adjacent street, began to play the weird refrain of that song which has touched the hearts of so many who have loved home: 

    “Home, home, sweet, sweet home—.”

He stopped and listened to the music as it stole plaintively from the distance into the room.  When he began to move toward the door again he was absently repeating the haunting refrain: 

    “Home, home, sweet, sweet home—.”

The music, as well as his words, had floated to the deep bay window; the curtains had swiftly and noiselessly parted, and she was stealing after his retreating figure with an expression mantling her face which brought out every detail of its great beauty.

As he raised his hand to open the door the organ drifted from the refrain to the air.

He began sadly to repeat the pathetic words: 

    “An exile from home—.”

Two warm, loving arms had stolen around his neck from behind and smothered the words on his lips:  “Not an exile from home, Harold; no, no, not that, dear!  The boots—­we understand better now—­forgive me, Harold.  Don’t go.  I——.”

Once more the organ had reached the refrain: 

    “Home, home, sweet, sweet home—.”

As he folded her passionately in his arms she drew his face down to hers and said, with the happy light still glowing and beautifying her face:  “We will take it as a good omen; to us, now, there shall be no place like home, shall there, dear?”

As he looked into her eyes he answered by lovingly repeating the refrain which was now dying softly away in the distance: 

    “Home, home, sweet, sweet home—.”

* * * * *

A Prairie Episode.

The fierce rays of the sun, which had turned the prairie grass into a lifeless-looking dusty brown, continued to pour pitilessly down on the horde of perspiring workmen, exhausted Indian ponies, and long-eared morose mules.