THE END.
* * * * *
AUNT HENRIETTA'S MISTAKE
BY FRANCES HENSHAW BADEN.
"Before thy soul, at this deep lottery,
Draw forth her prize ordained by destiny,
Know that there's no recanting a first choice;
Choose then discreetly."
"Heigh-ho! This is Valentine's day. Oh, how I would like to get a
valentine! Did you ever get one, aunty?" said little Etta Mayfield.
"Yes, many of them. But not when I was a child. In my day children
were children. You get a valentine! I'm e'en a'most struck dumb with
astonishment to hear you think of such things. Go, get your doll-baby,
or your sampler, and look on that. Saints of Mercy! It seems only
yesterday you were a baby in long clothes," answered Miss Henrietta
Mayfield, a spinster of uncertain age; but the folks in the village,
who always knew everything, declared she had not owned to a day over
thirty-five for the last ten years. This, if true, was quite
excusable, for Miss Henrietta's little toilette glass reflected a
bright, pleasant, and remarkably youthful face.
"I'm almost seventeen, aunty, and I'm tired of being treated like a
child," said Etta, with a pout of her rosy lips.
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