hill and dale, the "sensible" girls and their
escort roll merrily into old Yarmouth, with its broad, shady streets and
big, substantial, old-fashioned houses. Quaint and picturesque indeed it
is, with quiet nooks and corners, breezy streets, time-stained wharves
where lie battered fishing craft and the smarter boats devoted to the
summer visitors who have found out the beauties of the town. Here, too,
Arno Cummings has an uncle, a bluff and breezy old sea-captain, who
gives the whole party a hearty welcome; and at his house, the club spend
two nights and the day between--a day of shade and shine, with the sea
wind blowing everywhere. They explore the old town from end to end. They
come continually upon pictures,--now a broad grassy lane with its
moss-grown fences flanked by rising pastures of brownish grass; now a
long slope ending in a rocky outlook over the blue sea; now a brown
cottage nestled in among trees and hills. And on the second morning
after their arrival, they bid the hospitable Captain Cummings adieu, and
pass, single file, over the great drawbridge across the inlet that cuts
Yarmouth in two, and so spin along through the succession of little
towns which, leaving Yarmouth, almost join together into one. Such are
the "Dennises"--divided as usual into North, East, South and West,--and
the "Harwiches," where at Harwich proper the tricyclers bid farewell to
the railroad which has kept them company at short intervals all the way
down.

"Six miles to Curtin Harbor." So says the lazy youth at a cross roads
store, and away they spin, while the spires and houses of Harwich
disappear behind the trees.

And now how the wind blows! And all around the horizon the sky has that
watery appearance that betokens the nearness of the sea. There is a
peculiar, bracing freedom in the wild, salt wind; the very sway of the
brown grass, the swing of the odorous wild pinks that nod in the corners
of old mossy fences have a life and freshness that one misses greatly in
tamer, more settled districts. For now they are plunging bravely into
the long stretch of sand barrens and pine woods that, with only an
occasional house, stretch for many a mile between Harwich and Curtin
Harbor.

But here, in the afternoon, a sudden shower overtakes them. They can no
longer pick their dainty way by the roadside, but must keep the middle
track or run the risk of upsetting. There is scarce a quarter of a mile
of level ground to be found. The pine