ULIBARAAUISUDIBIRS VTIGUR JOU ICTUEIS SS IROIREMCINE UAE SHOWN

sunshine might prove the best restoratives. He had drawn the bag of buttons
from beneath his pillow.

“T used to think that when I grew up, I would be a soldier,” he said; “ but
a soldier must be straight and tall and strong, and perhaps they would not mind
a lame missionary. I should find my knowledge of Chinese useful. Yes,” con-
tinued Alexander, with his seraphic smile, “I should like to be a missionary —
and get killed, only that would be hard on my family and friends. I shall never
play with these again, and so, as the Chinese are fond of buttons, will you please
send them to the little Chinese baby? Papa says the highest honor the Em-
peror can bestow is a Crystal Button, and she may like to wear some of them
when she goes to a party. Tell her to be good to the poor lame one, for he be-
longs to the army just the same, and can keep step with the music, even if he
has to lag behind the rest, instead of marching at the head, a shining splendid
Alexander!”

“ He isn’t a boy,” sobbed Sister Agatha; “he is an angel.”

It was some time before Sister Agatha was able to leave her hospital duties to
visit Alexander. He was in the garden, the maid said.

There sounded a tremendous clash and din and clatter; a hideous discord of
drums and gongs and bells; acrash of tin pans struck together; a crackling
symphony of shrill horns and pipes, and around the corner rushed a horde of
small boys in hot pursuit of a racing, galloping dog, who was evidently enjoy-
ing the sport as much as any of them.

The leader had cast himself upon Sister Agatha, and flung his arms around
her neck.

«« Alexander — can it be Alexander?” exclaimed Sister Agatha, bewildered,
for this sturdy boy’s hair was close cropped, and his face was streaked with red
and yellow and green‘paint. “ What are you doing, dear?”

“Playing heathen. You see,” explained Alexander, “all the fellows want
to be heathens, and so we have to play that Bruno is the missionary. The
Chinese music is such fun.”

“ But— but the money for the Foreign Mission ?”’

“T’ve bought a bicycle.”

“ But, Alexander,’ said Sister Agatha, with gentle reproach, “ what will be-
come of the poor little Chinese baby ?”

“Oh! if anything should happen,” returned Alexander, his seraphic smile
losing itself in a vermilion tattoo on either cheek, “there are lots of babies
in China, you know.”

“‘He isn’t an angel,” sighed Sister Agatha; “he is a boy.”
Edith Robinson.