tly delighted the hearts of
the children, and made them dance with glee; and, truth to say, reader,
there are coarser and homelier things in the world than a well turned
shaving.

"There, go now," he said, when both of them stood with both hands full;
"go now and play; and mind you don't let the baby wet her feet, Sally;
them shoes o' hern must have cost five-and-sixpence at the very least."

That sunny hour before sundown seemed as long to Sally as the whole seam
of the sheet; for childhood's joys are all pure gold; and as she ran up
and down the white sands, shouting at every shell she found, or darted
up into the overhanging forest for checkerberries and ground-pine, all
the sorrows of the morning came no more into her remembrance.

The little Mara had one of those sensitive, excitable natures, on which
every external influence acts with immediate power. Stimulated by the
society of her energetic, buoyant little neighbor, she no longer seemed
wishful or pensive, but kindled into a perfect flame of wild delight,
and gamboled about the shore like a blue and gold-winged fly; while her
bursts of laughter made the squirrels and blue jays look out
inquisitively from their fastnesses in the old evergreens. Gradually the
sunbeams faded from the pines, and the waves of the tide in the little
cove came in, solemnly tinted with purple, flaked with orange and
crimson, borne in from a great rippling sea of fire, into which the sun
had just sunk.

"Mercy on us--them children!" said Miss Roxy.

"_He's_ bringin' 'em along," said Mrs. Kittridge, as she looked out of
the window and saw the tall, lank form of the Captain, with one child
seated on either shoulder, and holding on by his head.

The two children were both in the highest state of excitement, but never
was there a more marked contrast of nature. The one seemed a perfect
type of well-developed childish health and vigor, good solid flesh and
bones, with glowing skin, brilliant eyes, shining teeth, well-knit,
supple limbs,--vigorously and healthily beautiful; while the other
appeared one of those aerial mixtures of cloud and fire, whose radiance
seems scarcely earthly. A physiologist, looking at the child, would
shake his head, seeing one of those perilous organizations, all nerve
and brain, which come to life under the clear, stimulating skies of
America, and, burning with the intensity of lighted phosphorus, waste
themselves too early.

The little Mara seemed like a f