have this matter settled with Hubert Varrick."
"It would not look well for you to mention the matter," cried Gerelda.
"Somebody must do it," returned her mother, severely, "and the longer it is put off the worse it will be; the marriage can not take place too soon. Come, my dear," she added, "you must dry your tears. Never permit any living man to have the power to give you a heartache."
"You talk as if I was a machine, mother, and could cease loving at will!" cried the beauty.
"It is much as a woman makes up her mind. If you worry yourself into the grave over a man, before the grass has time to grow over you he will have consoled himself with another sweetheart. So dry your eyes, and don't shed a tear over him."
Gerelda walked slowly from the room. It was not so easy to take her moth
