ink of any shipwrecked hero who was ever stuck in the mud, so
I played the mud was a desert, and that I was Marco What's-his-name in
his shrouded tent, and--"

"It was the Turk, who was at midnight in his shrouded tent," interrupted
Eunice, again.

"Was it? Well, I played it, anyway. Then I put my head down on my arm to
look like him, and I must have gone to sleep, for the sun was pretty
hot, even under my tent, and it made me dreadfully sleepy. Then I heard
you call me, and there was the water all around me. Can't we start, now,
Edna?"

"We can't get over that last bar nearest the shore, yet awhile,"
answered Edna, "but we can start as soon as there is the least bit of
water over it, for by the time we get there the water will be deep
enough to float us."

"I don't care how long we stay, now," said Eunice, contentedly, "since
Cricket is here, and not out there all alone. I'll row in, Cricket."

"See, there are the boys running along the shore, and beckoning.
Probably they mean it is safe to start now. Let's get ready. My goody,
doesn't it seem as if we had been here a week?"

"Don't let's come again till it's high tide in the middle of the day,"
said Eunice. "Here, now we have the things all in."

"Isn't this boat a spectacle?" said Eunice, surveying its mud-splashed
sides. "Won't the boys give you a blessing, Miss Scricket!"

"A blessing is a good thing to have," answered Cricket, quite
undisturbed, as she yielded the oars to Eunice, and sat in the stern
with Edna.

CHAPTER VIII.

A NEW PLASTER.

"It seems to me, my dear," said grandma, standing on the piazza, and
drawing on her gloves, "that it is a _very_ great risk to run to go and
leave those children to themselves for six whole hours. If you _could_
manage without me, I think I'll stay at home, even now," and grandma
looked somewhat irresolutely at the carriage, which was waiting at the
gate to take them to the station.

"I am afraid you must come, mother, on account of those business
matters," Mrs. Somers answered. "But the children will be all right, I
know. Eliza will look out for the small fry, and the elders must look
out for themselves," she added, looking down at the three, Eunice, Edna,
and Cricket, with a smile. "Don't get into any mischief, will you?"

The girls looked insulted.

"The very _idea_, auntie!" exclaimed Eunice. "As if we ever got into
mischief! Nobody looks after us especially, at Kayuna."

"And, consequently," s