"Felix Le Bras, what have you done with my kitten?"
"I haven't done any thing with your kitten," replied Felix. But since
he laughed as he spoke, his denial did not have the force that it might
have had if he had looked sober and in earnest.
"Why, what's the matter about your kitten? Isn't she all right? The
last time I saw her, she was right up here by the house," he continued.
"Didn't Jack carry her off?" asked Julia, looking perplexed.
"No, of course he didn't! We went fishing. Do you suppose we wanted a
cat for bait? Look there!"
As he spoke, Felix swung forward a very respectable string of blackfish,
with a long eel hanging from their midst. He then ran forward,
brandishing the fish and the swinging eel, coming right up on the steps
where the girls were standing. Julia and Sue screamed, ran back, and
got behind Johnny, who was laughing in spite of his efforts to look
dignified.
"Don't you accuse me of carrying off your kitten!" shouted Felix,
swinging the eel towards Julia. "I've had enough of your sauce before
now, Miss Julia Peterson."
Felix had not noticed Mrs. Peterson until now, when she came forward out
of the shady western piazza, saying,--
"No more rudeness, Felix! Go away with your eel!--Do you really know
nothing about Julia's kitten?"
"No, ma'am," replied Felix, trying to look more sober and gentlemanly:
"what should I know about her kitten?--How do you do, Ruth?--Come along
to the house, Johnny, and help me skin these things in time to have them
cooked for dinner."
Johnny very willingly followed Felix, taking out and opening his
jack-knife as he went. The girls brought up the rear, keeping out of
the sweep of Felix's eel; for he was still swinging his arm vigorously,
although with apparent carelessness. The carelessness was a pretence,
however; for once, when Julia came a little nearer, the tail of the eel
swung against her ankle, much to her horror.
"I tell you! but this eel is a slippery fellow! and if he didn't hold on
to the hook! I had to pull it out of his mouth by main force, holding
him down with my foot. Jack showed me how."
The girls shuddered; but Johnny said, "That's the reason I don't like to
catch eels: it is almost impossible to get the hook out of their mouths
any other way. I've caught them in the river, down by my
grandfather's."
Soon after the fish were dressed, the dinner-bell rang. Mrs. Le Bras
left the table after the first course of the dessert; but the children
sat for some time over the nuts and candy, chatting merrily. After
dinner they went out on the veranda, where the awning had been drawn to
keep out the rays of the sun. There was a cool breeze from the water;
and the waves curled merrily upon the beach, with a sound not unlike
laughter, as they dashed here and there against the white bowlders.
Pierre, who had been writing some law-papers for Mr. Le Bras, in his
room, all the morning, was reclining in the hammock when they came out.
He offered to give up the hammock, but the children preferred the great
comfortable piazza-chairs. Pierre had a book in his hand, but he did
not appear to be reading very attentively.
"Shall we disturb your reading, Pierre?" asked Johnny.
"Oh, no! I am not reading: I am only playing at reading. In fact, I am
too tired to read," replied Pierre, closing his book: "I think I had
rather hear you children talk."
"I miss my laboratory very much," remarked Johnny: "I think I will never
go away from home again without bringing my 'Play-Book of Science,' and
some materials for making experiments. If I had some of my apparatus
and chemicals here, I could amuse and interest the girls very much for a
while this afternoon."
"Oh, I wish you had!" said Julia. "I love to see experiments dearly:
I've been to some lectures where they had them, with my cousin Ernest,
who is at the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy."
"Is that so?" said Johnny. "I should like to know your cousin very
much. Is he coming to see you this summer?"
"No: he has gone up into the mountains with his folks."
"What is your 'Play-Book of Science'?" inquired Pierre.
"You wouldn't think it much of a play-book if you could see it; it is
one of the deepest books I have; and the experiments are most of them so
elaborate that I haven't been able to try them yet, and can't until I
get a good deal older. It is a book my father had when he was a boy,
and goes into philosophy and chemistry pretty thoroughly. It is very
interesting, and has four hundred and seventy pictures illustrating the
experiments and principles. There are over four hundred pages of pretty
fine print."
"Who is the author of it?"
"Professor Pepper."
"Oh, yes! An English professor. I know. It must be an excellent work."
"And I have the 'Play-Book of Metals,' by the same author."
"Who are the publishers of the books?"
"Routledge & Sons, London."
"I should like to see your laboratory, Johnny," said Julia. "I went
into a very large laboratory with Ernest, once: it was full of bottles
and all sorts of queer things for performing experiments."
"Johnny's would make you laugh, then," said Felix. "It's a little room;
and all his bottles are vials, and they're in a small closet."
"But he's learned a lot up in that laboratory," said Sue. "And he can
perform ever so many pretty experiments. You can make fire burn under
water, can't you, Johnny?"
"Yes: I learned that out of the 'Play-Book.'"
"I don't see how you can make any thing burn under water," remarked
Ruth; "for water puts out fire."
"Can't you tell, Felix?" asked Johnny.
"How can I tell?"
"You remember about the gunpowder burning shut up in the holes the men
drilled?"
"Yes. That was because fire is produced by the oxygen of the air
uniting with the carbon and hydrogen in other substances; and although
the air is shut out in the drill-hole, there is oxygen in the nitre,
which unites with the sulphur and charcoal."
"Bravo, Felix!" exclaimed Pierre: "you may be a scholar yet! I didn't
think Johnny had got you as far as that."
"Oh, yes! What with Johnny and you and uncle Frank, I'm getting quite
learned, I guess. Can't you begin to call me professor, girls?"
"Not till you know more than that," said Sue; "for I know that."
"Felix has got the idea about the fire under water, I guess," said
Johnny. "You see, I mix some nitrate of potash, powdered charcoal,
sulphur, and nitrate of strontium, and put it into a long narrow paper
case, tightly closed with gum. I set it on fire at the bottom, and sink
it in the water by a piece of lead hung to it."
"And sometimes the fire is red," said Sue.
"Yes; but I have a different mixture for the red fire. You see, Ruth,
the reason water puts out fire is because it shuts out the oxygen by
shutting out the air. If you can furnish oxygen to a combustible
material under water, you can burn it under water. As I put something
in my mixture to furnish oxygen, I have a fire without any trouble. But
I have seen a larger laboratory than the one you saw, Julia."
"Where?"
"Oh! I've seen one in everyplace I ever was in.--That's a riddle for
you. See who'll guess it first."
"No, you haven't seen one in every place you were ever in; for you
haven't seen one here at the beach?" replied Julia.
"Yes, I have."
"It's some nonsense," said Felix. "We'll give it up. There's no fun in
trying to guess riddles that have a catch in them: you never can guess
them."
"I can see a part of a great laboratory from where I am sitting,"
returned Johnny, who was sitting on the doorstep. "Or, at least, I can
see a part of one of its distilleries."
Pierre began to smile.
"I can't see any of its great retorts," continued Johnny, "nor the
furnaces under them, nor the gas burned as it comes out. But I can see
a good many of the contrivances for storing up heat so that it can be
kept cool in a very useful, beautiful form until the heat is needed,
when it can very easily be brought out again in flames. And I can see
some more of the stored heat that has gone through a second process, by
which it serves the purpose of slow combustion, which gives heat and
force without any light."
Pierre began to laugh. "Can't you guess the riddle now?" he said.
But the children still looked puzzled.
"Oh! I haven't been trying to guess," said Felix: "I think riddles are
more trouble than they are worth."
"There is a good deal of the slow combustion going on in this veranda,"
continued Johnny, "and some of the stored-up force; though the machines
might be made a good deal more active, if it were not just after
dinner-time, when the fuel that's been put in is in a pretty compact
form, and hasn't begun to be distributed much. In an hour or two the
machines may get quite antic."
"He means us, by the machines, don't he?" said Julia.
"But what do you mean by the great retorts?" asked Felix.
"And the heat stored up in a cool form?" added Ruth.
"And the big distillery?" queried Sue.
"I should think you would know about the big distilleries, yourself,
Sue. Come and sit here by me, and you can see quite a piece of one of
them."
Sue came and sat down by Johnny.
"Now look right ahead."
"I don't see any thing but the water, and a blue strip of land beyond."
"And which would the distillery have in it? land or water?"
"Why, water.--He means the sea."
"I mean the Atlantic Ocean for one of the distilleries, a part of which
I see from here."
"What do you call that a distillery for?" asked Felix.
"Why, distilling is obtaining a liquor in a pure form, by vaporizing it,
and then cooling the vapor back into liquid form. Vapor is pure liquid:
no mineral substances can be taken up in it. I have a little apparatus
at home for distilling water. I can take well-water, which has mineral
substances in it, and obtain the water quite free from any thing else.
That is what is going on from the oceans, and, in a smaller way, from
the rivers, lakes, and ponds. The heat of the sun causes the water,
which, you know, here at the ocean is very salt, and full of other
impurities, to rise in pure vapor, and form clouds overhead. The winds
carry the clouds over the land: they become condensed by cooling, and
fall in rain. The rain, which is pure water, except for the little
particles of various things floating in the air which it brings down
with it, soaks into the ground, forming springs, and helps to swell the
ponds and lakes and rivers, and so it gets mineral and other substances
in it again, especially salt, which is found in small quantities in all
spring-water, and this impure water is carried to the ocean again to be
purified; that is, it is carried back to the great distillery, to be
made into pure rain-water. What I can't make out is, what is to keep
the ocean from getting too salt by and by, since considerable salt is
always coming into it from the rivers. What do you think about it,
Pierre?"
"There are various ways by which the ocean gets rid of some of its salt,
the most important of which is the making of salt, by men, out of salt
water; and the natural manufacture, by the salt water lodging in the
rocks, and then evaporating, and leaving the salt, which is collected in
large quantities. There may be some way of its escaping, too, that has
not been found out. I am pretty sure there is some natural provision by
which the ocean can never become too salt, as long as the earth is
intended for the home of man."
"I thought the reason why the ocean is salt, is because there is a great
deal of salt in the bottom, which washes up into the water," remarked
Ruth.
"That may be one reason," replied Johnny; "though the books don't say
so. Don't you think, Pierre, that a good deal of the salt may have come
from salt deposits under the oceans?"
"I don't see why not. There is a great amount of surface under the
oceans, and it would be a wonder if there were not great deposits of
salt there, as well as on the land; although they must be pretty well
covered up by this time, by ocean deposits."
"But how about those retorts?" asked Felix, who had seen Johnny's
experiment of making a little retort out of a clay pipe.
"I don't know what a retort is," remarked Julia.
"Nor I," said Ruth.
"A retort is a place where you heat any combustible very hot, without
letting the air get to it. Of course, if there is no oxygen at hand, it
can't burn; and so the heat merely causes the hydrogen to separate from
the carbon, in the form of gas. They have large retorts at the
gas-works, in which they heat soft coal excluded from the air; and, you
know, the gas that is driven out is carried through pipes into the
houses and stores, and then, when the gas is allowed to escape from one
of the jets, they light it, and, because there is oxygen around, it
burns steadily until you shut it off; that is, until you exclude the
air."
"But how about your retorts in your big laboratory?" asked Felix.
"The largest that I have heard of," continued Johnny, "is around
Pittsburg. That is in the soft-coal region. The heat in the earth has
driven off the gas, or hydrogen, from the coal in the mines. Once, when
they were boring a well, some of this pent-up gas, which was where they
happened to be boring, burst out in a kind of explosion, tearing their
boring apparatus all to pieces, and frightening the workmen pretty
thoroughly. Afterwards the gas at this hole got on fire, and burned in
a great big jet. But it was some time before the Pittsburg folks got it
through their heads that nature had some monstrous big gas-works under
them, so that they had only to pipe the gas, and bring it into their
houses and manufactories, to get rid of using the coal that made
Pittsburg such a black, smoky city. But they found it out after a
while; and now they have not only natural-gas lights, but gas-fires in
their manufactories, so that the atmosphere is as pure in Pittsburg as
in any other manufacturing city."
"Then, the coal from which the gas came must be coke," said Felix,
"something like that folks buy at the gas-works, after they have got the
gas out?"
"Yes: it is the carbon of coal without the hydrogen, and so it does not
burn with a flame; the flame of a fire is the burning of the hydrogen
which escapes from the coal or wood when it is heated, and its burning,
as it rises, makes the flames that leap up and curve about so in a fire.
The anthracite coal is coal which has had most of the hydrogen driven
out by heat."
"I wish you would tell us now," said Ruth, "about the stored-up heat in
a cool form. I've been wondering about that most of all."
"You know plants can't grow without sunlight, Ruth?"
"Yes; that is, I know that if they don't have sunlight, they will grow
very white, as they do when they are in a cellar."
"If the cellar were perfectly cold and dark, they would not grow at all;
but they grow, as you have seen them, because there is some sunlight and
sunheat, even in a cellar. The heat of the sun causes the plants to
grow by taking in carbon from the air, and hydrogen from the water in
the earth, and in rain and dew, and so the carbon and hydrogen are
gradually stored up in the plants and trees; of course, there is the
largest quantity in trees, because they grow large and solid. And it
has been proved that you can get just as much heat by burning these
things afterwards, that is, making the carbon and hydrogen unite with
the oxygen from which they had been taken away, as there was heat of the
sun expended in the process of their growing, or gathering up carbon and
hydrogen."
"I remember about your telling that before, at the doctor's when I hurt
my head; but I don't see how they ever proved it," said Felix.
"You could understand by studying it up. I have books that tell how it
was proved. So, you see, it amounts to this,--that the heat from the
sun is stored up some way, in the things that have grown out of the
earth; and the very amount of heat stored, without a particle of waste,
can be got out of the combustible a thousand or more years after it was
bottled up in that way."
"Not a thousand years!" exclaimed Julia. "Trees don't live to be a
thousand years old."
"Yes,--the big trees of California," said Ruth.
"That's so," said Johnny; "but I was thinking of the coal mines which
are old, buried forests packed hard under ground, where the stored heat
has been preserved so long, and will be preserved for no one knows how
many hundreds and thousands of years to come."
"But it will get used up sometime, and all the forests get cut off: I've
heard my father say so," said Felix.
"I suppose so; but by that time we shall have found out how to burn
water."
"To burn water!" exclaimed all but Pierre.
"Yes. They can burn water now, only the process is too expensive; but
by that time they will have found some very cheap way. That is what the
scientific men are pretty certain of. Water is composed of hydrogen and
oxygen; and, you see, hydrogen is very inflammable, being what we burn
for gas, and that which burns in a fire to make the flame, while oxygen
is the very gas it must have in order to burn."
"Then, I don't see why water isn't very inflammable indeed," said Felix
wonderingly. "I wonder the oceans and rivers and lakes haven't burned up
and set all the rest of the world on fire."
"Why, you see, the hydrogen in water won't unite with the oxygen in the
air, because it has all the oxygen it wants already. It has got to be
separated from the oxygen it has, before it will be ready to take in
oxygen, and so cause fire."
"Oh!" said Felix. "But I shouldn't think it would be so hard to get it
away from its oxygen."
"It is, though," said Johnny; "for hydrogen and oxygen have a very great
liking, or affinity, for each other."
"I should think, then," said Felix musingly, "if water is composed of
hydrogen and oxygen, that, when hydrogen combines with oxygen in the
burning of gas or a common fire, they would form water."
"So they do," said Johnny.
"Oh, no, they don't!" exclaimed Julia.
"Yes; although you do not notice it, because the water is in the form of
a fine vapor which passes off through the air. But I could prove to
you, if you were in my laboratory, that the flame of even a little taper
produces water. I have performed that experiment a good many times."
"Yes, he has," said Sue; "I've seen him: the water settles on the glass,
just as if you had breathed on it."
"And it can be done so that the drops will trickle down the sides of the
receiver," said Johnny.
"But how about the slow combustion going on in this veranda, Johnny?"
asked Sue.
"Slow combustion goes on in animals. They eat the plants in which the
sun has stored up heat, or other animals whose bodies have been formed
out of the stored heat in plants, and the carbon and hydrogen go into
their blood, and are carried by the blood to the lungs, where they come
in contact with the oxygen of the air, under a moderate heat, to make
more heat, by uniting with the oxygen to form carbonic-acid gas, which
is breathed out into the air to help furnish carbon for the plants."
"But there are no animals in this veranda, except a few flies," said
Julia.
"Oh, yes!" said Sue. "There's you and I, and Johnny and Felix, and Ruth
and Pierre!"
"I am not an animal!" exclaimed Julia indignantly. "Am I, Johnny?"
"The part of us that dies is animal," replied Johnny, "just as much as
Clyde or these flies are animals."
"No," persisted Julia: "we are folks."
"Our bodies are the highest kind of animals," said Johnny, smiling.
"You and Ruth are very good-looking animals."
"That's a pretty compliment!" exclaimed Julia. "Now I have been called
an animal, I have a mind to go right home. At any rate, I am going home
to see if I can find my kitten. If she is coming back at all, I am sure
she has come by this time."
"Let me go with you," said Felix mischievously.
"No, you don't! But Sue can go."
"You come, too, Ruth," said Sue.
"No, thank you," replied Ruth. "I think I ought to be going down to the
cottages by this time: I will ask your mother to excuse me a little
while, while I go to inquire if any one wants to hire a children's
maid."
"I think I'll go up with Ruth to see mamma, then," said Sue, "for I am
to go down to the cottages with Ruth."
"Why, they'll think you want to hire out, too, Sue," replied Julia.
"I don't care if they do. Come, Ruth."
Sue took Ruth's hand, and they went upstairs, while Julia ran home to
find the kitten. By this time, Pierre had fallen asleep in the hammock.
"I guess, while the girls are gone, I'll go out and pick some
huckleberries for supper, father is so fond of them," said Johnny; "and
Katie says we haven't more than half enough. She wanted us all to pick
some; but it was too warm after dinner, and I don't believe the girls
will be back in time. It is getting cool now, because there is such a
breeze."
"I'll bet there'll be a storm before long," replied Felix, looking at
the sky. "But it's too stupid picking berries! Can't we do something
else?"
"Perhaps you can, but I promised Katie," replied Johnny, going to the
kitchen for a tin pail. As Felix did not want to be left alone, and
could not think of any thing better to do, he followed Johnny to the
huckleberry pasture behind the house, with a tin cup in his hand. "It
is easier to pick in a cup than in a pail," he said.
"Why?" asked Johnny.
"Because it fills up sooner, and that is encouraging."
Pretty soon the boys saw Oliver harnessing the dog-cart; and, a little
after, Julia came out into the pasture with a pail, saying she could not
find the kitten, and she fully believed Jack had carried it off, whether
Felix knew about it or not.
"He hasn't done any such thing!" returned Felix: "he couldn't have taken
it without my seeing it, and I am positively certain he had no kitten
with him when we went down the road."
The dog-cart was brought around to the door, and Sue and Ruth drove down
to the row of cottages. When they reached the first cottage, Ruth got
out, and inquired at the door if they would like to hire a nurse-girl.
Sue drove to the pavilion, and then, having hitched the pony, joined
Ruth in the tour of inquiry. In the whole row of cottages, they found
only one where a girl was wanted: this was a neat yellow cottage with
red blinds, which was set quite a way back from the beach. There were a
number of children playing about the piazzas. They seemed fretful and
quarrelsome; and when Ruth asked one of the little girls what her name
was, she replied, "None of your business!" The lady of the house was a
short, fleshy woman, with a good many rings on her fingers. She looked
at Ruth coolly from head to foot, asking her a good many questions,
especially in regard to her references.
"My uncle keeps the lighthouse, ma'am, and he'll come down and tell you
about me."
"But I don't know any thing about the lighthouse keeper. And if he is
your uncle, of course he will recommend you."
"My mother will tell you what a nice girl she is," said Sue.
"And who is your mother?"
"She's Mrs. Le Bras."
"That lives in Mr. Louis Le Bras' cottage this season?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Very well, that will do: I will try to come up and see Mrs. Le Bras,
to-morrow or next day."
After the cottages had all been visited, and they were walking back to
the dog-cart, Sue said,--
"I did not like that woman with the rings at all."
"I didn't think the children were well behaved, either," replied Ruth
soberly; "but then, I don't suppose there could be a place just right,
perhaps, and they are the only family that want a girl: and if I change
my mind about wanting to hire out, I am afraid my aunt won't like it at
all; though my uncle will be glad."
"I wouldn't go there, anyhow," said Sue; "folks are moving out and in
these cottages almost every week, Oliver says, and there may be some
nice family who will want a girl before long. But I think it will be
nicer to stay with your uncle, and then we can visit back and forth, and
have good times. If you get hired, they won't let you visit, or any one
come to see you."
"I'm afraid my aunt won't let me visit, or have any one come to see me,
either," replied Ruth, wiping a tear from her eye: "she wouldn't have
let me come over here to-day, if she hadn't thought that maybe it would
help me get a place to work."
"I don't think she is nice at all!" exclaimed Sue.
Ruth made no reply.
"Why! how awful dark and windy it's getting!" said Sue: "I guess we'll
have to hurry home, or we'll get caught in the rain."
Ruth had been so taken up with sober thoughts, that she had not noticed
the change in the weather; but she and Sue now hastened their steps, and
were soon driving home as fast as the pony seemed willing to take them,
which was at a rather moderate trot.
They had gone but a little distance, before there was a rumbling of
thunder, and some large drops flew in their faces.
"I'm awful 'fraid we can't get home before it comes right down; and I'm
kind of 'fraid of thunder, aren't you?" said Sue. "I do wish I'd
brought that whip!"
"I am not afraid of thunder or lightning," replied Ruth encouragingly.
"My uncle and I sometimes go up into the lighthouse to see the
lightning: it is better than fireworks."
There was a team driving very fast behind them. Sue turned to one side
to give it plenty of room.
"Hallo, youngsters!" said a familiar voice.
"Why, papa!" exclaimed Sue.
The carriage with the two gentlemen stopped.
"Hold on, Sue!" said Mr. Le Bras.
Sue stopped.
"They must get in with us, and let the pony shift for himself; since he
will never get there before the shower," said a hearty voice that Sue
did not recognize. She looked up just as the light buggy stopped at the
side of the dog-cart, and saw a large, fine-looking gentleman in the
buggy with her father. He was holding the reins. He and Mr. Le Bras
quite filled up the narrow seat of the light vehicle. "Hand 'em over,"
continued the gentleman, as Mr. Le Bras alighted.
Mr. Le Bras helped Ruth out first, and put her in the buggy. The stout
gentleman took her on his knees, and gave her a hug.
"Well, my dear!" said he, "we'll save you from a wetting, if possible."
Mr. Le Bras put Sue in, and, after tying the reins over the pony's back,
slapped him, and told him to hurry up. The pony jogged on at a very
little faster pace; while Mr. Le Bras got into the buggy, and took Sue
in his lap. Mr. Frothingham started the fast horse. They left the pony
behind them. The drops came thicker and faster, a flash of lightning
half blinded them; but they reached the house just as the storm came on
in its fury, with thunder and lightning, and pelting rain. The pony was
far behind, coolly making his way at his ordinary jog-trot, like a
sedate philosopher. Oliver took Mr. Frothingham's team to the barn, and
gave the horse some oats. Mr. Le Bras ushered his guest into the parlor.
Mr. Frothingham followed him, leading Ruth and Sue by the hand.
"So you are the lighthouse keeper's niece?" he said to Ruth, as he
seated himself in the great arm-chair, which Mr. Le Bras drew forward
for him, and took a girl on each knee: "why, I've played with him many a
time, when we were barefooted boys together."
"You!" exclaimed Ruth.
"You don't mean that you were ever a bare-footed boy, and lived about
here?" exclaimed Sue, equally astonished.
"Why not, now?" replied Mr. Frothingham laughing; while Mr. Le Bras went
up-stairs to ask his wife to come down and see their guest.
"Because," said Sue, "you're all dressed up, and wear a diamond pin.
And aren't you the man that lives up in the big cottage, and that Felix
says is a millionnaire, with more money than he knows what to do with?"
"That may all be true, my dear: but you know we live in America, where a
barefooted boy may have as good a chance as any man, and perhaps better;
because, you see, if I hadn't been a barefooted boy, who knew how to
work and how to save, as very few do know how except poor men's
children, I might never have been able to wear a diamond pin,--though
that isn't of much consequence,--or build a cottage by the grand old
sea, and have time to come and spend a summer in enjoying nature, when I
am getting to be too old and heavy to want to work as hard as a young
man can."
When Mrs. Le Bras came down, she, too, was surprised to learn that Mr.
Frothingham had been born in that neighborhood, and had lived there
until he was almost a young man.
"Certainly," said Mr. Frothingham. "I was born in a little brown
farmhouse over towards the quarry: my father was the minister of the
church over on the hill. He had a very small salary, and the farm
helped support us."
"The white meeting-house with green blinds?" asked Felix; for he and
Johnny had come in to see Mr. Frothingham.
"The very same, my boy: only it has been repainted and repaired inside,
since my day. This little girl's grandfather was a near neighbor of
ours, and one of my father's best parishioners. He was a very honest,
kind-hearted, straightforward man; and his wife was a very dear friend
of my mother's. Ethan was the oldest of the family, and worked hard,
from the time he was big enough to handle a hoe; he had the hardest time
of any of the children, and didn't get the schooling the others did; but
that was partly because he was so ambitious about working, that he would
not stop to go to school. It was a mistake, but he meant it all right;
and he's helped his folks, and been an industrious, saving man. As for
this little girl's mother,--and she looks just like her,--how well I
remember Lucy! she was always one of the best scholars in school: we
were in the same class. I saw her nearly every day of my life, and
never too often, until I went to the city. When I came back, and found
she was married to a nice young farmer here, I was a good deal taken
back, for a while.--You see, it was my love for the old scenes that made
me build a cottage here. When a man gets along in life, he likes to
come back to the place where he was born: no other place can be quite so
dear. I hoped once to have my children spend half of every year where I
passed my childhood; but they are both gone. Mary, a girl of about
Ruth's size, died over a year ago, and my wife hasn't been like herself
since. Our boy died before the cottage was finished, and Mary only spent
one season here."
"I am so sorry for you and your wife," said Mrs. Le Bras: "I don't know
what I should do without my children."
"I have been telling Mr. Frothingham what I should do," remarked Mr. Le
Bras.
"Yes," said Mr. Frothingham; "but, as I said in reply, there are some
objections."
At that moment, the tea-bell rang; and, as it was still raining, Mr.
Frothingham was persuaded to go out to tea with them.
"How came you home so early, father?" asked Johnny. "Mother thought you
wouldn't be back until in the evening."
"We saw the squall coming up," replied Mr. Le Bras; "and I told Mr.
Frothingham, as your mother was so timid, I thought, as we were not far
out, we had better put in before the storm."
"I am so thankful you did," said Mrs. Le Bras: "I should have been
worried; I have heard of so many accidents to yachts lately."
"Mine is not one of that kind, and I have a very expert man to sail it,"
replied Mr. Frothingham; "but I never like to have a lady unhappy if I
can help it, and so I made for land as soon as your husband told me how
easily you are frightened."
It stopped raining about the time tea was over, but still looked dark
and lowering. Mrs. Le Bras said she must take Ruth home, according to
her promise; or, if the gentlemen thought it would rain again, she would
send her with Oliver, and call on her uncle and aunt some pleasant day
herself.
"Why, I can take the child home, with my fast horse, without danger of
getting caught in the next shower," replied Mr. Frothingham. "I would
like to see Ethan too: I haven't been over to the lighthouse yet this
season, for a wonder, or I should have known of his good luck in getting
possession of Lucy's girl."
So it was concluded that Ruth should go with Mr. Frothingham. Oliver
brought the team around; and after the children had said good-by, and
that Ruth must come again soon, Mr. Frothingham put her in the buggy,
got in himself, and drove off, taking the road across to the shore, to
be ahead of the rain that seemed threatening. He talked sociably and
kindly and interestingly all the way; and Ruth almost forgot it was a
great man by her side instead of a boy of about her own age, he laughed
so heartily, and took a child's view of things so easily. The fact was,
Mr. Frothingham was one of those men who never wholly outgrow their
childhood: he could feel like a boy after he was a middle-aged man.
When they reached the lighthouse, Mr. Shepard, who had seen them coming,
was standing on the doorstep to welcome them.
"How do you do, Ethan?" said Mr. Frothingham, grasping Mr. Shepard's
hand warmly.
"How d'y' do, Henry?" replied Mr. Shepard as heartily; "so it's you that
have brought home that gal of mine! Glad enough to see you."
Mr. Shepard led the way into the parlor, and threw open all the
window-blinds in a hurry.
"I can't see what wimmin want to keep out all the daylight for," he
said; "but that's Martha's way.--You go tell yer aunt there's a friend
of mine here, Ruth, an' I'd like to introduce her."