expect
nothing from it. I confess, however, I should like to know the object of
the cruise; for one does not wish to be idle, and my brother-in-law, the
Sergeant, is as close-mouthed as a freemason. Do you know, Mabel, what
all this means?"

"Not in the least, uncle. I dare not ask my father any questions about
his duty, for he thinks it is not a woman's business; and all I can say
is, that we are to sail as soon as the wind will permit, and that we are
to be absent a month."

"Perhaps Master Pathfinder can give me a useful hint; for a v'y'ge
without an object is never pleasant to an old sailor."

"There is no great secret, Saltwater, concerning our port and object,
though it is forbidden to talk much about either in the garrison. I am
no soldier, however, and can use my tongue as I please, though as little
given as another to idle conversation, I hope; still, as we sail so
soon, and you are both to be of the party, you may as well be told
where you are to be carried. You know that there are such things as the
Thousand Islands, I suppose, Master Cap?"

"Ay, what are so called hereaway, though I take it for granted that they
are not real islands, such as we fall in with on the ocean; and that the
thousand means some such matter as two or three."

"My eyes are good, and yet have I often been foiled in trying to count
them very islands."

"Ay, ay, I've known people who couldn't count beyond a certain number.
Your real land-birds never know their own roosts, even in a landfall
at sea. How many times have I seen the beach, and houses, and churches,
when the passengers have not been able to see anything but water! I have
no idea that a man can get fairly out of sight of land on fresh water.
The thing appears to me to be irrational and impossible."

"You don't know the lakes, Master Cap, or you would not say that. Before
we get to the Thousand Islands, you will have other notions of what
natur' has done in this wilderness."

"I have my doubts whether you have such a thing as a real island in all
this region."

"We'll show you hundreds of them; not exactly a thousand, perhaps, but
so many that eye cannot see them all, nor tongue count them."

"I'll engage, when the truth comes to be known, they'll turn out to be
nothing but peninsulas, or promontories; or continents; though these are
matters, I daresay, of which you know little or nothing. But, islands or
no islands, what is the object of the cruise, Master Pathfind