ey's and bring her to the house.

Captain Eli was delighted with the arrangements. "Things now seem to
be goin' along before a spankin' breeze," said he. "But I don't know
about the dinner. I guess you will have to leave that to me. I don't
believe Captain Cephas could eat a woman-cooked dinner. He's
accustomed to livin sailor fashion, you know, and he has declared over
and over again to me that woman-cookin' doesn't agree with him."

"But I can cook sailor fashion," said Mrs. Trimmer,--"just as much
sailor fashion as you or Captain Cephas, and if he don't believe it,
I'll prove it to him; so you needn't worry about that."

When the captain had gone, Mrs. Trimmer gayly put away the sail. There
was no need to finish it in a hurry, and no knowing when she would get
her money for it when it was done. No one had asked her to a Christmas
dinner that year, and she had expected to have a lonely time of it.
But it would be very pleasant to spend Christmas with the little girl
and the two good captains. Instead of sewing any more on the sail, she
got out some of her own clothes to see if they needed anything done to
them.

The next morning Mrs. Trimmer went to Captain Eli's house, and finding
Captain Cephas there, they all set to work at the Christmas tree, which
was a very fine one, and had been planted in a box. Captain Cephas had
brought over a bundle of things from his house, and Captain Eli kept
running here and there, bringing, each time that he returned, some new
object, wonderful or pretty, which he had brought from China or Japan
or Corea, or some spicy island of the Eastern seas; and nearly every
time he came with these treasures Mrs. Trimmer declared that such
things were too good to put upon a Christmas tree, even for such a nice
little girl as the one for which that tree was intended. The presents
which Captain Cephas brought were much more suitable for the purpose;
they were odd and funny, and some of them pretty, but not expensive, as
were the fans and bits of shellwork and carved ivories which Captain
Eli wished to tie upon the twigs of the tree.

There was a good deal of talk about all this, but Captain Eli had his
own way.

"I don't suppose, after all," said he, "that the little gal ought to
have all the things. This is such a big tree that it's more like a
family tree. Cap'n Cephas can take some of my things, and I can take
some of his things, and, Mrs. Trimmer, if there's anything you like,