girl," said Mrs.
Blackett, with much amusement. "There was a great many more Bowdens then
than there are now, and the folks was all setting in meeting a dreadful
hot Sunday afternoon, and a scatter-witted little bound girl came
running to the meetin'-house door all out o' breath from somewheres in
the neighborhood. 'Mis' Bowden, Mis' Bowden!' says she. 'Your baby's in
a fit!' They used to tell that the whole congregation was up on its
feet in a minute and right out into the aisles. All the Mis' Bowdens
was setting right out for home; the minister stood there in the pulpit
tryin' to keep sober, an' all at once he burst right out laughin'. He
was a very nice man, they said, and he said he'd better give 'em the
benediction, and they could hear the sermon next Sunday, so he kept it
over. My mother was there, and she thought certain 'twas me."

"None of our family was ever subject to fits," interrupted Mrs. Todd
severely. "No, we never had fits, none of us; and 'twas lucky we didn't
'way out there to Green Island. Now these folks right in front; dear
sakes knows the bunches o' soothing catnip an' yarrow I've had to favor
old Mis' Evins with dryin'! You can see it right in their expressions,
all them Evins folks. There, just you look up to the crossroads,
mother," she suddenly exclaimed. "See all the teams ahead of us. And,
oh, look down on the bay; yes, look down on the bay! See what a sight o'
boats, all headin' for the Bowden place cove!"

"Oh, ain't it beautiful!" said Mrs. Blackett, with all the delight of a
girl. She stood up in the high wagon to see everything, and when she sat
down again she took fast hold of my hand.

"Hadn't you better urge the horse a little, Almiry?" she asked. "He's
had it easy as we came along, and he can rest when we get there. The
others are some little ways ahead, and I don't want to lose a minute."

We watched the boats drop their sails one by one in the cove as we
drove along the high land. The old Bowden house stood, low-storied and
broad-roofed, in its green fields as if it were a motherly brown hen
waiting for the flock that came straying toward it from every direction.
The first Bowden settler had made his home there, and it was still the
Bowden farm; five generations of sailors and farmers and soldiers
had been its children. And presently Mrs. Blackett showed me the
stone-walled burying-ground that stood like a little fort on a knoll
overlooking the bay, but, as she said, there wer