The Widow Grant.

Otago Witness, Issue 1419, 1 February 1879, Page 31

The Widow Grant.

"Harry Fredericks, agad nineteen, shot in the battle of Fredericksburg "

Such was a part of the inscription upon a plain marble slab in the little cemetery of Allandale.

Mrs Grant, strolling by the grave, stopped for a moment to read the simple record. " Aged nineteen," she murmured. " Only a boy." And then, as if by some Bubtle feelin? of sympathy, she sat down on the soft turf near by and let her thoughts go wandering back to that mournful time when so many homes were bo desolate, because their "boys " were in the midst of danger and death. "Harry. 'Our Harry' to somebody," she said to herself, gathering a spray of myrtle that trailed about the grass, and laying it tenderly in her palm. " A blue eyed, blonde-haired Harry, broad-chested and strong-armed. A warm-hearted, big-Bouled Harry, brave as a lion and tender ac a woman — somebody's darling, somebody's stay and consolation."

The tears stood in the womaa's eyes and dropped over h,er cheeks. She, too, had loat