would certainly chill any romance that might arise." "That's nonsense, Patsy!" "Then you consider me beautiful, Uncle John?" "I mean it's nonsense about your going with Maud and Beth. I won't allow it." "Oh, Uncle! You know I can twine you around my little finger, if I choose. So don't, for goodness' sake, start a rumpus by trying to set your will against mine." "Then side with me, dear. I'm quite right, I assure you." "You're always right, Nunkie, dear," she cried, giving him a resounding smack of a kiss on his chubby cheek as she sat on the arm of his chair, "but I'm going with the girls, just the same, and you may as well make up your mind to it." Uncle John coughed. He left his chair and trotted up and down the room a moment. Then he carefully adjusted his spectacles, took a long look at Patsy's face, and heaved a deep sigh of resignation. "Thank goodness, that's settled," said Patsy cheerfully. Uncle John turned to the boy, saying dismally: "I've done everything in my power for these girls, and now they defy me. They've declared a thousand times they love me, and yet they'd trot off to bandage a lot of unknown foreigners and leave me alone to worry my heart out." "Why don't you go along?" asked Jones. "I'm going." "You!" "Of course. I've a suspicion our girls have the right instinct, sir—the tender, womanly instinct that makes us love them. At any rate, I'm going to stand by them. It strikes me as the noblest and grandest idea a girl ever conceived, and if anything could draw me closer to these three young ladies, who had me pretty well snared before, it is this very proposition." "I don't see why," muttered Uncle John, wavering. "I'll tell you why, sir. For themselves, they have all the good things of life at their command. They could bask in luxury to the end of their days, if they so desired. Yet their wonderful womanly sympathy goes out to the helpless and suffering—the victims of the cruellest war the world has ever known—and they promptly propose to sacrifice their ease and brave
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