who delight in any labour, so it be
unprofitable) had undertaken to load the ferry-boat; but having in mere
exuberance of good-nature imbibed more beer than was good for him, he
could not be trusted with the chinaware.

Neighbours appeared at every doorway--the more emotional ones with red
eyes--to wish Mrs. Trevarthen good-bye. She answered them tremulously;
but her mind, all the way down the street, ran on a hamper of chinaware,
the cover of which she could not remember to have tied. Her left arm
rested in Aunt Butson's (who carried the parrot's cage swathed in an old
petticoat); on her right she bore a covered basket.

At the slip Mr. Toy handed her on board. He himself would cross later in
the horse-boat, with his handcart and the heavier luggage.

"Better count the parcels, missus," he advised. "There's fifteen, as I
make out; and Mr. Vro'll hand 'em out careful 'pon t'other side.
You'd best wait there till I come across with the rest."

Instead of taking her seat at once, Mrs. Trevarthen stood for a moment
bewildered amid the packages crowding the thwarts and the sternsheets; and
most unfortunately Old Vro selected this moment to thrust off from shore
with his paddle. The impetus took her at unawares, and she fell forward;
her basket struck against the boat's gunwale, its cover flew open, and
forth from it, half-demented with fright, sprang her tabby cat,
Methuselah. The poor brute lit upon the parrot's cage, which happened to
be balanced upon an unstable pile of cooking utensils at the end of Nicky
Vro's thwart. Cat, cage and parrot, a gridiron, two cake tins, a bundle
of skewers, and a cullender, went overboard in one rattling avalanche, and
Master Calvin laughed aloud from the shore.

Nicky Vro, with a wild clutch, grabbed hold of the cage before it sank,
and dragged it and the screaming bird out of danger. The gridiron and
skewers went down at once--luckily in four feet of water, whence they
could be recovered at low-ebb. The cullender sank slowly and with
dignity. The cat headed straight for shore, and, defying all attempts of
Mr. Toy and Aunt Butson to head him off, slipped between them and dashed
up the hill on a bee-line for home. Master Calvin, seated astride the low
wall above the slipway, almost rolled off his perch with laughter.
Uncle Vro, cage in hand, turned on him with sudden fury.

"Better fit you was at your lessons," he called back, shaking his fist,
"than grinning there at your