ts were about
to proceed. The ladies, however, were not so much engrossed with
rifle-shooting as to neglect the calash. It passed from hand to hand;
the silk was felt, the fashion criticized, and the work examined, and
divers opinions were privately ventured concerning the fitness of so
handsome a thing passing into the possession of a non-commissioned
officer's child.

"Perhaps you will be disposed to sell that calash, Mabel, when it has
been a short time in your possession?" inquired the captain's lady.
"Wear it, I should think, you never can."

"I may not wear it, madam," returned our heroine modestly; "but I should
not like to part with it either."

"I daresay Sergeant Dunham keeps you above the necessity of selling your
clothes, child; but, at the same time, it is money thrown away to keep
an article of dress you can never wear."

"I should be unwilling to part with the gift of a friend."

"But the young man himself will think all the better of you for your
prudence after the triumph of the day is forgotten. It is a pretty and a
becoming calash, and ought not to be thrown away."

"I've no intention to throw it away, ma'am; and, if you please, would
rather keep it."

"As you will, child; girls of your age often overlook the real
advantages. Remember, however, if you do determine to dispose of the
thing, that it is bespoke, and that I will not take it if you ever even
put it on your own head."

"Yes, ma'am," said Mabel, in the meekest voice imaginable, though her
eyes looked like diamonds, and her cheeks reddened to the tints of
two roses, as she placed the forbidden garment over her well-turned
shoulders, where she kept it a minute, as if to try its fitness, and
then quietly removed it again.

The remainder of the sports offered nothing of interest. The shooting
was reasonably good; but the trials were all of a scale lower than those
related, and the competitors were soon left to themselves. The ladies
and most of the officers withdrew, and the remainder of the females soon
followed their example. Mabel was returning along the low flat rocks
that line the shore of the lake, dangling her pretty calash from a
prettier finger, when Pathfinder met her. He carried the rifle which
he had used that day; but his manner had less of the frank ease of the
hunter about it than usual, while his eye seemed roving and uneasy.
After a few unmeaning words concerning the noble sheet of water before
them, he turned towards