CHAPTER V.

"'Directions for entering the room at an evening party.—Fix your eye on the lady of the house on entering, and advance toward her with outstretchedhand, looking neither to the right nor to the left, until you have interchanged the ordinary salutations of the occasion. When this is done, turn aside and mingle with the other guests.'

Now, mamma, just imagine it,—marching in with your hand out and your eye fixed!" And Marian, relinquishing the Manual to Cannie, flew to the door, and entered in the manner prescribed, with her eyes set in a stony glare on her mother's face, and her hand held before her as stiffly as if it had been a shingle. No one could help laughing.

"I don't think the hand and the glare are necessary," said Mrs. Gray; "but it is certainly quite proper to speak to the lady of the house, when you come in, before you begin to talk to other people."

"Here's another," cried Marian, hardly waiting till her mother had done speaking. "Just listen to these—

"'Directions for a horseback ride. Mounting.—The lady should stand on the left side of the horse, with her right hand on the pommel of her saddle, and rest her left foot lightly on theshoulder of her gentleman attendant, who bends before her. When this is done, the gentleman will slowly raise himself to the perpendicular position, and in doing so lift the lady without difficulty to the level of her seat.'"

"My gracious! suppose he didn't," remarked Georgie, looking up from her painting. "There she would be, standing on his shoulder, on one foot! Imagine it, on the Avenue!" And the four girls united in a peal of laughter.

"But there is something here that I really want to know about," said Candace. "May I read it to you, Cousin Kate? It's in a chapter called 'Correspondence.'"

"Oh, my!" cried Marian, who still held fast to one side of the Manual. "It tells how to refuse gentlemen when they offer themselves to you. Here it all is. You must say,—

"'Sir,—I regret extremely if anything in my manner has led to a misapprehension of my true feelings. I do not experience for you the affection which alone can make the marriage relation a happy one; so I—'"

"No, no," interrupted Candace, blushing very pink, and pulling the book away from Marian; "that isn't at all what I wanted to ask you about, Cousin Kate. It was—"

"Oh, then perhaps you meant to accept him," went on the incorrigible Marian, again getting possession of one side of the "Manual of Gentility." "Here you are:—

"'Dear Friend,—Your letter has made me truly happy, breathing, as it does, expressions of deep and heartfelt affection, of which I have long felt the corresponding sentiments. I shall be happy to receive you in my home as an accepted suitor, and I—'"

"Cousin Kate, make her stop—isn't she too bad?" said Cannie, vainly struggling for the possession of the book.

"'And I'—let me see, where was I when you interrupted?" went on Marian. "Oh, yes, here—

"'And I am sure that my parents will give their hearty consent to our union. Receive my thanks for your assurances, and believe—'"

But Candace had again got hold of the volume, and no one ever learned the end of the letter, or what the lover of this obliging lady was to "believe."

"Thisis what I wanted to ask you about, Cousin Kate," said Candace, when quiet was restored. "The book says:—

"'The signature of a letter should depend upon the degree of familiarity existing between the writer and the person addressed. For instance, in writing to a perfect stranger a lady would naturally use the form,—Yours truly,Mrs. A. M. Cotterell.'"

Yours truly,Mrs. A. M. Cotterell.'"

"Oh! oh!" interrupted Georgie. "Fancy any one signing herself 'Yours truly, Mrs. A. M. Cotterell.' It's awfully vulgar, isn't it mamma?"

"That is a very old-fashioned book," observed Mrs. Gray; "still I don't think, even at the time when it was published, that well-bred people used a signature like that. It may not be 'awfully vulgar,' but it certainlyis not correct; nothing but the Christian name should ever be used as a signature."

"But suppose the person you were writing to did not know whether you were married or not," said Candace.

"Then you can add your address below, like this;" and she wrote on the edge of her drawing-paper,—

"Yours truly,"Catherine V. Gray.

"Mrs. Courtenay Gray,"Newport, R. I.That is what I should do if I were writing to a stranger."

"Then there is this about the addresses of letters," went on Candace:—

"'In addressing a married lady, use her maiden as well as her married name; for example, in writing to Miss Sarah J. Beebe, who is married to George Gordon, the proper direction would beMrs. Sarah B. Gordon,Care of George Gordon,Oshkosh,Michigan.'

"'In addressing a married lady, use her maiden as well as her married name; for example, in writing to Miss Sarah J. Beebe, who is married to George Gordon, the proper direction would be

Mrs. Sarah B. Gordon,Care of George Gordon,Oshkosh,Michigan.'

Is that right, Cousin Kate?"

"No; that is decidedlywrong. When Miss Beebe married, she became not only Mrs. Gordon, but Mrs. George Gordon, to distinguish her from any other Mrs. Gordons who might happen to exist. She shouldsignherself 'Sarah B. Gordon,' but her letters and cards should bear her married name, 'Mrs. George Gordon.'"

"But people do write to widows in that way, don't they?" asked Gertrude. "I recollect, when I went to the post-office with Berry Joy one day, there was a letter for her mother, directed to Mrs. Louisa Bailey Joy."

"Yes; people do, but not the people who know the right way," her mother replied dryly. "A man's Christian name doesn't die with him any more than his surname. I often see letters addressed to Mrs. Jane this and Mrs. Maria that, but it never seems to me either correct or elegant. It is a purely American custom. English people have never adopted it, and it seems very odd to them."

"Well, about cards," continued Marian, who was turning over the leaves of the"Manual of Gentility." "See what a funny little card this is; and the writer of the book says it is the kind we ought to have." She pointed to a page on which appeared a little oblong enclosure bearing the name

Fannie C. Jones.

"That isn't nice a bit, is it, mamma?"

"No, I confess that it does not look to me at all right. Girls old enough to need cards are old enough to have 'handles to their names.' If I were that young woman I should spell 'Fanny' without theie, and call myself 'Miss Frances C. Jones' on my card, and keep my pet name for the use of my friends, and not print it."

"I think I've learned a good deal to-day," said Candace. "The funny old book isn't right in what it says, but Cousin Kate knows; so it comes to the same thing in the end. I'm glad you gave it to me, Gertrude."

Gertrude had the grace to feel ashamed, as she saw Candace's perfect freedom from shame.

"Oh, dear! how much there is to learn!" continued Candace, with a sigh. She was still deep in the "Ladies' Manual of Perfect Gentility."

"Put away that book, Cannie," said her cousin; "or give it to me, and I will hide it where Gertrude shall not find it again. Good breeding can be learned without printed rules."

"Can it, mamma?"

"Yes; for, as I was saying this morning to Gertrude, good manners are the result of good feeling. If we really care about other people, and want to make them happy, and think of them and not of ourselves, we shall instinctively do what will seem pleasant to them, and avoid doing what is disagreeable. We shall refrain from interrupting them when they are speaking. We shall not half listen to what they say, while our eyes are roving about the room, and our attention wanderingto other things. We shall be quick to notice if they want anything that we can get for them. We shall not answer at random, or giggle, or say the wrong thing. We shall not loll back in our chairs, as Georgie is doing at this moment, with one foot cocked over the other knee, and a paint-brush in our mouths."

"Mamma!" And Georgie hastily recovered the upright position, and took her paint-brush from between her lips.

"We shall not drum idly on window-panes, as Gertrude was doing just now, for fear that the little noise will be disagreeable to our neighbors."

"Now, mamma!"

"We shall not walk carelessly between any one and the fire, because we shall be afraid of making them cold; nor shall we upset a work-basket while doing so, as Marian upset mine just now."

"Mamma, I do believe you are giving us all a scolding; I shall just stop you." And Marian flung her arms round her mother'sneck, and gave her half a dozen enormous kisses.

"We shall consider a kiss as a favor," went on Mrs. Gray, inexorably, holding Marian off at arm's length, "not a punishment to be inflicted whenever we happen to feel like it. We shall never trot one foot when we are nervous, and shake the table."

"Cannie, that's you. I thought it would be your turn soon," said Marian.

"Oh! did I trot?" said Cannie. "Please excuse me, Cousin Kate. I have such a bad habit of doing that. Aunt Myra says it's my safety-valve."

"If it's a safety-valve, it's all very well," replied her cousin. "I didn't know. In short, my dears, as the poet says,—

'Manners are not idle, but the fruitOf noble nature and of lofty mind.'

The instinct of self-control, of gentleness, of consideration and forethought and quick sympathy, which go to make up what we call good breeding; the absence of noise andhurry, the thousand and one little ways by which we can please people, or avoid displeasing them,—are all taught us by our own hearts. Good manners are the fine flower of civilization. And everybody can have them. I always say that one of the best-bred men of my acquaintance is Mr. Jarvis, the mason. I have known him come up out of a cistern to speak to me, dressed in overalls and a flannel shirt; and his bow and his manner and the politeness of his address would have done credit to any gentleman in the world."

"Mamma, how funny you are," said Georgie, wonderingly; but Gertrude caught her mother's meaning more clearly.

"I rather like it," she said slowly. "It sounds like something in a poem or a storybook, and it would be nice if everybody felt like that, but people don't. I've heard Mrs. Joy speak quite rudely to Mr. Jarvis, mamma."

"Very likely. I never have considered Mrs. Joy as a model of manners," repliedMrs. Gray, coolly. "And that reminds me to say just one other word about good breeding toward servants and people who work for us, or are poor and need our help. Gentleness and politeness are even more important with them than they are with other people."

"Why more, mamma?"

"Because their lives are harder than ours, and we owe them all the little help that courtesy can give. Because, too, we are their models, consciously or unconsciously, and if we are polite to them they will in return be polite to us. And besides, they meet us at a disadvantage. If a servant 'answers back,' she is called impertinent and discharged; but I should think it must be rather hardnotto answer back to some mistresses."

"Is that why you are always so very polite to Jane?" asked Gertrude. Jane was the cook.

"Yes, partly that; and partly because I want Jane to be very polite to me; and she always is."

"There is the sun at last, I do declare," cried Marian, springing up. "Hurrah! I should think it was time. Now we shall have some nice weather, Cannie. Newport is lovely after a fog. It looks so nicely washed, and so green. Mamma, couldn't we have a long drive this afternoon in the wagonette, across the beaches and way round by the windmill? I like that drive so much."

"Yes; and at dinner we will eat Cannie's health in her birthday cake. It is making now, and Jane has the seventeen little pink candles all ready. How the fog is rolling away! It will be a charming afternoon."

UNDAY morning brought the fresh, lovely stillness which Sundays in early summer seem always to possess in Newport. Later in the season the roll of wheels and the jingle of plated harnesses come to mar this peacefulness; but till the very end of June it endures, and is one of the sweet things of the place.

The Joys were at breakfast. It was one of the points in which Mrs. Joy took most pride, that this meal was served in a special apartment known as the breakfast-room, and not, as with most families, in the room where they dined. The breakfast-room was not large, but sumptuous in all its appointments. A critical taste might have objected that the plush curtains which shaded the windows were tooheavy for summer; that the begilded wallpaper "swore" a little at its own dado and frieze, as well as deadened the effect of the pictures which hung against it; and that the drapery of lace and velvet which veiled the fireplace made a fire inconvenient and almost impossible, however cold the weather might be. But a critical taste might have found the same faults with the whole house. The general effect was of costliness and magnificence; but the details were at variance, and comfort and homelikeness had been sacrificed in the effort to make everything fine. There was a library, with almost no books in it; a ball-room, which was used only for balls, and looked bare and shut up on ordinary days; a huge drawing-room, full of costly toys,—tables loaded with Sèvres cups, other tables with processions of pug-dogs in precious china, snuff-boxes, patch-boxes; chimney-piece crowded with porcelain figures and bits of old Dresden ware; there was a great deal of carving andor-moulu,—but it all had the air of being created and kept forcompany use, and deserted the moment company went away. Mrs. Joy had only got so far in her art education as this, that she bought everything which cost a great deal of money and which her neighbors bought, and she never stopped to reason about such minor points as taste, fitness, convenience, or the adaptation of an article to her own particular needs.

Mrs. Joy was the very image of a prosperous woman, as she sat behind her heavy silver coffee-pots and cream-jugs, reading the Sunday paper, to get which her groom had ridden a couple of miles before breakfast. Her very black hair was trained into a line of formal rings across her forehead, which as yet scarcely showed a wrinkle. Her tightly laced figure was almost as slender as her daughter's; and the hand sparkling with diamonds, which held the paper, was white and youthful. Handsome she certainly was; and people called her agreeable, for she talked a great deal, in a noisy, lively way, and had a caressing manner for all persons whom shethought it worth her while to caress. But her face was hard; and when the society smile died out of it, it was neither intelligent nor kindly. Mrs. Joy had been extremely pretty in her youth. Berenice was like her; but Tom Joy the son resembled his father, who had died three or four years before the opening of this little story.

Berry and her friend Ethel Curtis were talking about a sailing party which they had planned for the next day.

"The Grays and the Halletts, and Julia Prime, that makes seven; mamma for matron, eight; then there's Tom and George Rivington, and the two Fosters. I can't think where we are to get the other three men."

"It isn't like a dinner party. The numbers need not be exactly equal," suggested Ethel.

"That's true, but it's a great deal better fun to have them equal. Men hate to talk to two girls at once, and the girls who haven't any men to talk to feel left out. Carrol Benton is coming up the end of the week; I wish he were here now."

"I guess you'd better look up some other matron, and let me off," said Mrs. Joy, laying down her newspaper. "I don't care much for sailing. I'm so apt to feel a little sick, and that spoils all the pleasure of it. Ask Mrs. Freddy Allen; she is young, and likes to go everywhere, and Freddy will go along and make another gentleman."

"That will do nicely if you really don't want to go, mamma. We'll invite them all as we come out of church, and save the bother of writing notes. It's easier to explain when you see people than to write down everything."

"Yes, that's one of the conveniences of going to church," remarked Mrs. Joy, calmly. "I've often had as many as three or four invitations, coming out of Trinity on a Sunday morning in the season. These muffins are horrid. James, tell the cook she ought to be ashamed of herself to send up such things. They're as tough as leather, and burned besides—as black as my shoe, I do declare."

"Yes, 'm."

And James departed to incense the cook with the unsoftened message. The cook declared that when ladies came down an hour late for breakfast, they must expect tough muffins; and for her part she didn't care whether they were good or not; she didn't think much of the place anyway, and didn't mean to stay on. There'd be plenty of people coming in a week or two, and plenty of places to pick and choose from. Mrs. Joy was always having little difficulties with her servants.

Trinity Church looked cool and shady, as the party entered it from the dazzle of the outer sunshine. Berenice Joy was perfectly well-trained in the outward forms of devotion. She called herself "High Church;" and nothing could be more graceful than the manner in which she glided up the aisle, bowed to the chancel, and sank on her knees, for what was supposed to be a short interval of silent prayer. But her eyes went straight to the Grays' pew the moment she rose, and from thence to the Halletts', and she whisperedto Ethel, "They're all here. That's nice." Then she indulged in a long stare at Candace, who had come to church with her cousins, and who, in her new cream-and-brown foulard, with the daisy-trimmed hat, and a pair of the birthday gloves on her slender hands, looked quite differently from the ill-dressed little passenger of the "Eolus" the Monday before.

"Do look! That's the very girl we saw on the boat," went on Berenice, in the same low whisper. "Did you ever! Hasn't Mrs. Gray done her over nicely? I wonder where she got that hat?"

"I wonder what she has done with the old one?"

"Given it to the cook, or sold it to the rag-and-bottle man," retorted Berry. Then came a suppressed giggle, which ended in sudden, forced gravity as the opening words of the service fell on their ears, and they rose with the rest of the congregation.

Candace was not conscious that she was being looked at. She had only once or twicein her life been in an Episcopal church, and never before in an old one. Trinity seemed to her as wonderful and picturesque as some of the churches she had read about in books. She looked at the square pews where people sat sideways, instead of fronting the chancel as in ordinary churches. She noted the tall wands with gilded tops, which marked the places of the junior and senior wardens; the quaint, swinging chandeliers of old brass; the tablets on the walls, two or three bearing inscriptions in honor of dead rectors or other departed worthies, one to the memory of a young girl, with a beautiful flying figure in bas-relief, carved in white marble. She gazed with amazement at the pulpit,—one of the ancient "three-decker" pattern, which is rarely seen now-a-days, with a clerk's desk below, a reading-desk above, above that a lofty pulpit for the clergyman, to which a narrow flight of stairs gave access, and suspended over all an enormous extinguisher-shaped sounding-board. It looked large and heavy enough to crush any clergyman who should be caught by itsfall while in act of preaching; and Candace watched its slight oscillations with an apprehensive fascination, till she recollected that it must have hung there for a hundred years at least, so there was no reason to suppose that it would drop on this particular Sunday.

By turning her head a very little she could get a glimpse of the organ-loft, with its quaint little organ bearing two gilded mitres and a royal crown on top, and below, the inscription, "The Gift of George Berkeley, late Lord Bishop of Cloyne." She wondered who George Berkeley could have been, and resolved to ask Cousin Kate as they went home if there was any story about him.

There was no whispering or giggling in Mrs. Gray's pew. The girls were too well trained for such irreverence; and except that Georgie interchanged one little smile with Berry Joy as she came in, not one of them looked away from the clergyman till the sermon was over and the benediction pronounced. It had been an impressive service to Candace,who was used to the barer forms of the Congregational church; and she was surprised to perceive how little solemnizing effect it seemed to have on the congregation in general.

The moment people rose from their knees, a low buzz of conversation began. Berry Joy seized on Georgie and Gertrude, and began to unfold the sailing plan as they walked down the aisle. Mrs. Joy took possession of Cousin Kate. Everybody seemed to have something to say to somebody. Candace caught scraps of half-a-dozen different conversations before she reached the door, and not one of them related in any way to the sermon or to anything religious. She overheard one invitation to dinner, another to drive, an inquiry about a dressmaker, a bit of gossip about a new engagement, a request for a recipe for mayonnaise. She supposed it must be the right thing to chatter thus, since all these delightful-looking people did it; still it seemed to her country notions rather queer.

The carriage was waiting in Spring Street, a little farther up the hill. She did not liketo get in till the others were ready, so she stepped aside among the gravestones, and looked up to where the white, slender spire of the old church towered against the blue. She was trying to make out the Episcopal mitre surmounted by the gilded weather-vane, when Mrs. Gray saw and beckoned to her.

She was still talking with Mrs. Joy, and that lady was saying, "I may possibly not be able to go myself, but if I am prevented I will see that the young folks have a proper matron. And then, my dear, there's Captain Davis, you know. I never let Berry sail with any one else. He's so safe and so careful, and the weather promises to be perfect."

"It certainly is perfect to-day," said Mrs. Gray. "Candace dear, I want to introduce you to Mrs. Joy. My cousin, Miss Arden, Mrs. Joy; or rather my niece, for her mother was like my own sister. She has come to spend the summer with me. Cannie, Mrs. Joy is the mother of the young lady who came down with you in the 'Eolus.'"

"Ah, indeed, the girls did not tell me about that," said Mrs. Joy. "Well, my dear,"—Mrs. Joy would have said "my dear" to Queen Victoria or the Empress of China, if she had ever had the chance of an interview with those potentates,—"you've come to a charming place and to charming relatives, I'm sure, and you can't fail to enjoy your summer. You must come with your cousins to-morrow to this sailing-party which my young folks are getting up. They'll be delighted, I'm sure."

"Thank you," said Candace, timidly, glancing at Mrs. Gray.

"That will be very nice," said her cousin. "Cannie has not been on the water yet. It is a new pleasure for her. At four o'clock, you said, Mrs. Joy?"

"Yes, dear, at four. And don't trouble to send down for the girls. It's impossible to tell exactly when they will get in, as it depends on the wind, and Berry will have the beach-wagon, and can bring them all up as well as not. Good-by, dear." And Mrs.Joy sailed toward her carriage, where the two girls were already seated.

"I've asked that Miss Arden who's staying with the Grays to go out sailing with you to-morrow," she said, as she took her seat. "You'll want another gentleman, Berry."

"Oh, mamma, whatdidyou do that for? She's the pokiest little thing. We didn't want her at all."

"Well, Mrs. Gray introduced her, and said she was almost her niece, and I thought it seemed to be expected. Mrs. Gray is always polite to our visitors, you know, and I don't like to seem to slight any of hers. What's the matter with the girl?"

"Oh, nothing's the matter, only she's poky, and doesn't seem to fit in somehow. You would understand if you had seen her the day she came. Mrs. Gray has dressed her up, as you might be sure she would; but then she looked like the backwoods, didn't she, Ethel?"

"She seemed nice-appearing enough to-day. You'll have to make the best you canof it, I guess; for Mrs. Gray accepted for her."

"It doesn't really signify," said Berry, discontentedly; "only it throws the party all out of shape. And she's younger than any of the rest, only just seventeen, Georgie says. She'd a great deal better stay at home with Marian."

It was fortunate that Candace did not guess how unwelcome her company was to the getters-up of the party, for the idea of the sail was most delightful to her. She had never been out in a boat in her life, not even on the smallest pond; and she had just discovered the strong fascination of the sea. She longed to get nearer to it, to know it better; and in her innocent little heart she thought, "How very kind it was in Mrs. Joy to invite me."

Sunday was always a particularly pleasant day at the Grays'. Mrs. Gray was wont to declare that though she did not believe in the Jewish Sabbath, she did with all her heart believe in the Christian day of rest; and she took pains to make it a happy one for allunder her roof. She gave her servants as much liberty as she could, simplified their work, and provided a plenty of good reading for such of them as stayed at home. Her own time was much more at the service of her family than it could be on ordinary days. She always took a walk with the girls in the cool of the afternoon, if the day were pleasant, and kept some book of a thoughtful kind to read aloud in the evenings. This Sunday it happened to be that wonderful little prose poem of Mrs. Oliphant's, "A Beleaguered City." Cannie found it absorbingly interesting, and even Mr. Gray laid aside his newspaper and listened to the very end.

The reading done, Candace found a chance to ask her question about George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne, the donor of the organ. There was a story about him, as it turned out, and a very interesting one. Mrs. Gray told how, when Dean of Derry in Ireland, the project of establishing a college in Bermuda for the education of English boys and of Indian youths to act as missionaries to their ownpeople, had taken possession of his mind; and he had given up his preferment, and crossed the sea with his family to engage in this chosen work. She described their landing in Newport on a Sunday morning when everybody was at church, and how the clergyman stopped in the middle of his sermon, and with all his congregation following him, hurried down to the water-side to receive the distinguished guest. She promised to take Candace out some day to see Whitehall,—the house which he built on the island, and in which he lived for some years, till the impossibility of carrying out his scheme for Bermuda drove him back again to Ireland; and also the rocky shelf still called "Bishop Berkeley's Rock," where he is said to have composed the lines which begin

"Westward the course of empire takes its way."

Then she looked up a photograph from Smibert's picture of Dean Berkeley and his family to show them, and by that time the girls had all grown interested; and when Marian saidthat she, too, wanted to go to see Whitehall, Georgie and Gertrude begged to be included also, and Mrs. Gray promised to take them all.

"One of the Dean's little children is buried in Trinity churchyard, Cannie," she ended; "you can look up the stone some day. It has 'Lucia Berkeley' carved upon it."

"I should like to," said Cannie. "It has been so nice to hear about him. How many interesting things have happened in Newport! I shall care a great deal more about that funny little organ, next Sunday."

Newport Harbor shone all blue and silver in the sun, as the party stepped on board the cat-boat "Cornelia" at sharp four on Monday afternoon. Mrs. Fred Allen, a tall, graceful brunette, seemed as much of a girl as any of the party which she was nominally to "matronize;" but "shewasmarried though she didn't look it," as Berry Joy remarked, and so was qualified to fill the place. There was a fair wind, which sent the boat smoothly along with little or no motion as they glidedpast the long sunken shoal off the end of Goat Island, and opened the view of Brenton's Cove, with the wreck of the old slaver lying in the deep shadow under one bank, opposite the ribs of the other stranded bark; while from beyond in the laughing bay, white-winged boats flitted to and fro, and seemed to beckon and make tempting signals to the poor defeated barks who might never sail or enjoy the sea again. Candace ventured to ask Gertrude in a whisper, "What are those?"

"Oh, only some old wrecks," replied Gertrude, carelessly; and she turned from Candace to talk to Tom Joy, who sat next to her.

The "Cornelia" was now running on the favoring wind between Fort Adams and the Conanicut shore. On one hand lay Newport, which looked like a dream city in the soft shine of the afternoon; on the other was the long hill line of the island, green with grasses, except where broken now and then by rocky cliffs, and indented with innumerable littlecoves and inlets,—some ending in strips of pebbly beach, others in stony shelves overhung by sea-weeds. The water was beautiful in color,—here pale flashing green, there purple in the shadow, with gleams of golden light and a low reach of shimmering blue toward the horizon. On sped the boat till they could almost touch the ledges. The rounded outline of the old fortification on the upper hill towered above their heads. Then suddenly she curved and wheeled off on the other tack, with the sharp line of Castle Hill and the Agassiz Point full in view.

Candace gazed with delighted eyes to left and right. Her mind was full of questions, but there seemed no one of whom she could ask them. Georgie and Berry were perched on the extreme point of the bow, with a young man stretched at their feet. Mrs. Fred was on the cabin roof amidships, with quite a little court of girls and young men about her. The couples who sat opposite and beside her seemed quite absorbed in each other. No one had spoken to Candace since the firstintroductions, and she was too shy to open a conversation with anybody.

"How I wish I knew!" she sighed to herself, half aloud.

Looking up, she met the shrewd, twinkling eyes of the Captain. Perhaps he had caught the words, for he asked encouragingly, "Did you speak, Miss?"

"No," said Candace, "I don't think I spoke. But I was wondering about that—that—thingup there," pointing to the Fort.

"That? That's Fort Dumpling, as folks call it. It is a kind of a queer old place, ain't it? They don't use it now for no war purposes, but it makes a pretty p'int in the landscape, and folks go there for picnics and such in the summer season."

"When was it built?" asked Candace, charmed to find somebody able and willing to satisfy her curiosity.

"Wa'al, I reckon it was about 1812, when we was a-tackling the British for the last time. 'Tain't very much of a fort to look at; but if you was to mount some of them powerfulguns they make now on the walls, them and the others over at Fort Adams yonder would protect the channel pretty well. The shot'd reach clear across. Why, you hardly think it perhaps, but not more'n four or five years ago, there was some folks who had come on a kind of an excursion, taking their lunches up there by Fort Dumpling, and some soldiers was firing at a long-range target over there to Fort Adams, and one of the balls came over and hit a young lady."

"How dreadful!" said Candace, her eyes measuring the long distance between the two points. "And it seems so far away. I suppose the young lady felt perfectly safe. I am sure I should have. Did it kill her?"

"Oh, no! they thought at first it had, but it didn't turn out so bad as was expected. The soldiers, they felt mighty mean, I expect. You see, they didn't intend a mite of harm to her or anybody; but it just shows how far them big guns carry now-a-days. A war-ship now, unless she was some kind of a monitor or that, would stand a fair chance of beingstove and sent to the bottom before she could get in to attack Newport."

"What a fanny little house that is close down to the water!" remarked Candace, looking off to the opposite shore.

"That's Professor Agassiz's laboratory. Do y' see that kind of a cove which sets in there near by the building, and a little black thing sticking up out of it? That's the pipe of his steam-launch. He and the rest go out in it and dredge for fish and such like, and then they experiment on them inside."

"What do they do that for?" asked Candace.

"Wa'al, they want to find out about 'em, I reckon. I was in there once and saw them at work, but I couldn't make nothing out of it, and there wasn't anybody I could ask."

"Oh, what is that?" cried Candace, as the "Cornelia," tacking again, opened one of the little bays on the south end of Conanicut, where a small steam vessel was lying. Two boats, which seemed to belong to her, were rowing in a parallel line with each other,and behind them appeared a long line of bobbing points which she could not at all understand.

"That's one of the fishing steamers, and the boats are drawing her nets," explained the Captain. "Didn't you ever see a seine drawn before? Wa'al, I declare! I'm mighty glad we happened just in time, for it's a cur'us spectacle. I guess we'll kind of hang about till they get the nets in, and then I'll take the 'Cornelia' up near enough for you to see."

"Captain, there are the seine-boats out," called Tom Joy at the same moment. "Let's sail up and see what they've caught."

The two boats began to near each other as they reached the limits of the long elliptical curves which made their course; and presently a great number of scintillating specks were seen in the space enclosed between them. There were the leaping fish, just conscious that they were crowded into a confined place, and desirous of escape. When they were quite close to one another, the boats turned and began to row for thesteamer. The "Cornelia" followed; and the Captain with a twist of the tiller threw her into the wind just beyond the great net, which by that time was being rapidly hauled in.

It was a wonderful thing to see,—the heavy mass of floundering fishes pouring over into the steamer's hold. Thousands and thousands of quivering silvery shapes of all kinds, from the fat, oily-bodied menhaden, to weird horned monsters with gaping mouths, and strange, half-translucent blocks like jelly, which seemed to have no mouths at all. Large and small, pinky white, black, blue,—in they poured. Now and then some fish more lucky than his fellows would splash over the side of the net and escape to liberty and the deep sea; now and then a fisherman with a sudden dash of his hand would single out a specimen choicer than the rest, a blue-fish, a chicken cod, or a sea-bass.

The little company in the sail-boat shared all the excitement of the catch. The young men left their flirtations for the boat's side, where they could get a better view. A greatdeal of chaff went on between Captain Davis and the captain of the menhaden steamer. Tom Joy amused himself by bargaining for blue-fish, and actually bought three big flapping specimens for a dollar and a quarter. They were deposited on the bottom of the "Cornelia," where they leaped painfully up and down, while the girls retreated for refuge to the upper deck, till Captain Davis at last caught the fish and stowed them away in his little cabin. It was not till the last loop of the seine was emptied, the last fish secured, and the boats were making ready for another cast, that the "Cornelia" finally glided away; and by that time a soft crimson glow had gathered in the west and the sun was nearing the horizon edge. The wind blew more freshly now, and with a zest and coolness which it had not had earlier in the afternoon.

Captain Davis pointed out to Candace the light-ship anchored in the offing between Point Judith and Brenton's Reef, and told her how the men who lived on board of her did not see a face from land for weekstogether sometimes, when winds were stormy and waves rough. Candace listened eagerly. The rest of the party had gone back to their old places, but there was not so much chatter now. The dreamy influences of the hour were felt by every one. Dick Foster was quoting Tennyson in a low voice to pretty Julia Prime. Berry Joy and Georgie still kept up a fitful conversation with their cavalier; but Gertrude had grown silent, and Tom Joy was whistling softly to himself, with his eyes fixed on the sunset.

The "Cornelia" sped silently seaward. Suddenly they were in the shadow of a deep cove at the very end of Conanicut; and close by them rose out of the sea an immense square table of rock, over which, still as it was, the surge was constantly flinging showers of white spray. The whole top of this rock was black with large sea-birds. Candace had never imagined such a sight. The birds seemed crowding each other on every inch of space. Each moment some of them would rise, wheel in air with wild cries and screams, and thensettle again to dispute for room, while the seething foam splashed over them; and the incessant flutter of their wings, the dashing spray, and the long wash of waves at the base of the rock gave to their place of refuge the effect of movement, so that it seemed to sway and float in the sea.

"Oh, what a wonderful place!" cried Candace. "Such big birds, and so many of them,—what do you call them, Captain?"

"Wa'al, they're mostly cormorants and gulls, I reckon. That's what we call them down to Newport. They ain't no good for eating, so they don't get shot; and they do increase powerfully, though it seems to me I never did see quite so many on the Kettle Bottom before as this afternoon."

"Is that the name of the rock?"

"Yes, the Kettle Bottom Rock; that's what it's called. It's a queer place. There was a painter here last summer, and he made a picter of it, with them birds all flying over it, which folks said was as like as like."

The line of hotels on Narragansett Beach was now plainly in sight. They were almost off Beaver Tail, and the sea was rougher.

"Captain, we may as well put about," said Tom Joy. "The sun's going down, and there's rather more motion hereabouts than the ladies like."

So they put about and sped harborward, helped by the tide which was now running swiftly in. Frank Rivington began to sing in a mellow tenor voice little barcarolles and Venetian boat-songs, which were full of a measured rhythmic movement like oar-strokes and the beat of waves. The pink in the west deepened after the sun went down to a vivid orange red, and flamed higher and higher till the zenith caught the glow; and a little crescent moon, which was climbing up, swung like a tiny silver boat on a crimson tide. It was all like a dream, to which the noiseless speed of the boat offered no interruption.

"Good-night, Captain," said Candace, gently, as the "Cornelia" touched the wharf, at the upper end of which the carriages werewaiting for them. "I'm so much obliged to you for telling me all about the things."

"You're welcome, I'm sure," replied the hearty Captain. "It's been nothing but a pleasure so far as I'm concerned. Hope I may take you out sailing again, Miss."

"Oh, I hope so. I think sailing is lovely."

"Good-by, Miss Arden. I hope you have enjoyed it," said Mrs. Allen, as she was borne off by her husband. It was the sole remark addressed by the "matron" of the party to the little stranger under her care during that afternoon; but Candace had not felt neglected.

"Oh, yes; very much, thank you," she replied. Tom Joy, who had waked up to the sense that "the little girl in the red hat" had not had much attention paid her on the sail, tried to get up a conversation as the beach-wagon climbed the hill; but Candace had but little small talk at her command, and they did not get on very fluently.

"I've had a lovely time, Miss Joy," she said shyly, as they were set down at home.

"I'm sure I'm glad. Good-night, Miss Arden." And that was all the notice which Berenice Joy took of her youngest guest, beyond the necessary good-afternoon when they first met on the wharf.

Candace was too unexacting, and too much accustomed to think of herself as a child to whom no particular attention was due, to realize or resent being treated with this scant courtesy. She told Cousin Kate about the sail and the seine steamer, and all the Captain's tales and explanations, with a glow of enjoyment which surprised Gertrude, and perhaps pricked her conscience somewhat; for that night, at hair-brushing time, she surprised Georgie by the observation, "After all, Cannie is quite a sweet little thing."

"So she is, sweet enough; but what makes you think of it just now?"

"Why, we rather left her out this afternoon, I am afraid. Hardly anybody said a word to her, except the Captain. It was rude enough of Berry, for it was her party; but I think it was worse for us. Any othergirl would have been hurt and cross, and showed it; but Cannie never seemed to mind a bit, and enjoyed everything, and was just as nice and pleasant as if she had been the belle of the party."

"Well, itwastoo bad," said Georgie, penitently. "I never thought about it, and I sat ever so far off from her, and Arnold Foster was so funny—in fact, I forgot Cannie. I took it for granted that she was being entertained, somehow."

"I'm afraid both of us find it pretty easy to forget Cannie," remarked Gertrude. "Well, I shall try to do better another time."

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