is a good while," said the old gentleman who sits
opposite, thoughtfully.

----Where have I been for the last three or four days? Down at the
Island, deer-shooting.--How many did I bag? I brought home one buck
shot.--The Island is where? No matter. It is the most splendid domain
that any man looks upon in these latitudes. Blue sea around it, and
running up into its heart, so that the little boat slumbers like a
baby in lap, while the tall ships are stripping naked to fight the
hurricane outside, and storm-stay-sails banging and flying in ribbons.
Trees, in stretches of miles; beeches, oaks, most numerous;--many of
them hung with moss, looking like bearded Druids; some coiled in the
clasp of huge, dark-stemmed grape-vines. Open patches where the sun
gets in and goes to sleep, and the winds come so finely
sifted that they are as soft as swan's down. Rocks scattered
about,--Stonehenge-like monoliths. Fresh-water lakes; one of them,
Mary's lake, crystal-clear, full of flashing pickerel lying under the
lily-pads like tigers in the jungle. Six pounds of ditto one morning
for breakfast. EGO _fecit_.

The divinity-student looked as if he would like to question my
Latin. No, sir, I said,--you need not trouble yourself. There is a
higher law in grammar, not to be put down by Andrews and
Stoddard. Then I went on.

Such hospitality as that island has seen there has not been the like
of in these our New England sovereignties. There is nothing in the
shape of kindness and courtesy that can make life beautiful, which has
not found its home in that ocean-principality. It has welcomed all who
were worthy of welcome, from the pale clergyman who came to breathe
the sea-air with its medicinal salt and iodine, to the great statesman
who turned his back on the affairs of empire, and smoothed his
Olympian forehead, and flashed his white teeth in merriment over
the long table, where his wit was the keenest and his story the best.

[I don't believe any man ever talked like that in this world. I don't
believe _I_ talked just so; but the fact is, in reporting one's
conversation, one cannot help _Blair_-ing it up more or less,
ironing out crumpled paragraphs, starching limp ones, and crimping and
plaiting a little sometimes; it is as natural as prinking at the
looking-glass.]

----How can a man help writing poetry in such a place? Everybody does
write poetry that goes there. In the state archives, kept in the
library of the Lord of the Isle