or the democratic sea toppled down the greatest
statesman in the land, and dashed over the bald pate of a millionnaire
with the same white-crested wave that stranded a poor parson on the
beach and filled a fierce reformer's mouth with brine. No fashion
ruled, but that which is as old as Eden,--the beautiful fashion of
simplicity. Belles dropped their affectations with their hoops, and
ran about the shore blithe-hearted girls again. Young men forgot their
vices and their follies, and were not ashamed of the real courage,
strength, and skill they had tried to leave behind them with their
boyish plays. Old men gathered shells with the little Cupids dancing
on the sand, and were better for that innocent companionship; and young
mothers never looked so beautiful as when they rocked their babies on
the bosom of the sea.

Debby vaguely felt this charm, and, yielding to it, splashed and sang
like any beach-bird, while Aunt Pen bobbed placidly up and down in a
retired corner, and Mr. Leavenworth swam to and fro, expressing his
firm belief in mermaids, sirens, and the rest of the aquatic
sisterhood, whose warbling no manly ear can resist.

"Miss Wilder, you must learn to swim. I've taught quantities of young
ladies, and shall be delighted to launch the 'Dora,' if you'll accept
me as a pilot. Stop a bit; I'll get a life-preserver," and leaving
Debby to flirt with the waves, the scarlet youth departed like a flame
of fire.

A dismal shriek interrupted his pupil's play, and looking up, she saw
her aunt beckoning wildly with one hand, while she was groping in the
water with the other. Debby ran to her, alarmed at her tragic
expression, and Mrs. Carroll, drawing the girl's face into the privacy
of her big bonnet, whispered one awful word, adding, distractedly,--

"Dive for them! oh, dive for them! I shall be perfectly helpless, if
they are lost!"

"I can't dive, Aunt Pen; but there is a man, let us ask him," said
Debby, as a black head appeared to windward.

But Mrs. Carroll's "nerves" had received a shock, and, gathering up her
dripping garments, she fled precipitately along the shore and vanished
into her dressing-room.

Debby's keen sense of the ludicrous got the better of her respect, and
peal after peal of laughter broke from her lips, till a splash behind
her put an end to her merriment, and, turning, she found that this
friend in need was her acquaintance of the day before. The gentleman
seemed pausing for permis