harred firs and tamaracks. In the
mistiness ahead of us the coast line, with its grim outlines softened,
lost itself and melted away as if nature, in a kindly spirit, had sought
to throw a veil over brutal features and covered them with a mantle of
tender hues.

"This is ideally beautiful," said Miss Jelliffe. "I can understand that
you may hesitate to leave all this to return to the grime of great
cities."

Thus we returned to the Cove, and the girl hastened to her father, eager
to tell him of our hunt and to show him the great head. I went with her
to the house, and took pleasure in seeing the interest shown by the old
gentleman. He certainly is a good sportsman.

"If Helen hasn't thanked you enough," he said, "I want to put in my oar.
I am really extremely obliged to you for giving her such a good time."

I left in a short time and Miss Jelliffe put out her hand in her frank
and friendly way. I must say she is a girl in many thousands.

And now I wonder why I am writing all this. My diary, begun in
self-defence at a time when I expected to spend so dreary a time that an
addled and rusted brain would result unless I sought hard to keep it
employed, scarcely has an excuse for being, now. The Jelliffes and the
Barnetts, with the good people of the Cove, are surely enough to keep a
man interested in the world about him. It has simply become a silly
habit, this jotting down of idle words.

CHAPTER XIV

_From Miss Helen Jelliffe to Miss Jane Van Zandt_

_Dearest Aunt Jennie_:

I am writing again so soon because I don't think I can sleep, to-night.
I know that some people can't possibly slumber off when they are
over-tired. That must be the matter with me, though I never realized it.

We had no more hunting after we killed that caribou. That night we
camped, and I heard stories, from two poor, humble men, that made my head
just whirl, for they were really Odysseys, or sagas, or any of the big
tales one ever heard of. It would seem, Aunt Jennie, dear, as if the
world is not at all the prosy thing some people take it to be. I suppose
that the great knights and warriors are altogether out of it now, but I
find that it is running over with men one usually never hears of, who
accomplish tremendous things without the slightest accompaniment of drums
or clarions.

We started back after a night during which I slept like a dead thing, but
naturally I was the most alive girl you ever saw when I awoke. The men
we