veneer--can stand in the presence of an honorable past, of ancestors distinguished and respected, whether they be his or another's, and be unmoved.

"And you say there are none to inherit all these things?" Croyden exclaimed. "Didn't the original Duval leave children?"

The agent shook his head. "There was but one son to each generation, sir--and with the Colonel there was none."

"Then, having succeeded to them by right of purchase, and with no better right outstanding, it falls to me to see that they are not shamed by the new owner. Their portraits shall remain undisturbed either by collectors or by myself. Moreover, I'll look up my own ancestors. I've got some, down in South Carolina and up in Massachusetts, and if their portraits be in existence, I'll add reproductions to keep the Duvals company. Ancestors by inheritance and ancestors by purchase. The two of them ought to keep me straight, don't you think?" he said, with a smile. 

PARMENTER'S BEQUEST

Croyden, with Dick as guide and old Mose as forerunner and shutter-opener, went through the house, even unto the garret. As in the downstairs, he found it immaculate. Josephine had kept everything as though the Colonel himself were in presence. The bed linen, the coverlids, the quilts, the blankets were packed in trunks, the table-linen and china in drawers and closets. None of them was new--practically the entire furnishing antedated 1830, and much of them 1800--except that, here and there, a few old rugs of oriental weaves, relieved the bareness of the hardwood floors. 

The one concession to modernism was a bath-room, but its tin tub and painted iron wash-stand, with the plumbing concealed by wainscoting, proclaimed it, alas, of relatively ancient date. And, for a moment, Croyden contrasted it with the shower, the porcelain, and the tile, of his Northumberland quarters, and shivered, ever so slightly. It would be the hardest to get used to, he thought. As yet, he did not know the isolation of the long, interminably long, winter evenings, with absolutely nothing to do and no place to go--and no one who could understand. 

At length, when they were ready to retrace their steps to the lower floor, old Mose had disappeared. "Gone to tell his wife that the new master has come," said Dick. "Let us go out to the kitchen."

And there they found her--bustling around, making the fire, her head tied up in a bandana, her sleeves 

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