sts of Western New York, to the bare
stony stretches of the Atlantic sea-board, is a severe one. No adult heart
can make it without a struggle. When Reuben looked out of the car windows
upon the low gray barrens through which he was nearing his journey end,
his soul sank within him. It was sunset; the sea glistened like glass, and
was as red as the sky. Draxy could not speak for delight; tears stood in
her eyes, and she took hold of her father's hand. But Reuben and Jane saw
only the desolate rocks, and treeless, shrubless, almost--it seemed to
them--grassless fields, and an unutterable sense of gloom came over them.
It was a hot and stifling day; a long drought had parched and shriveled
every living thing; and the white August dust lay everywhere.

Captain Melville lived in the older part of the town near the water. The
houses were all wooden, weather-beaten, and gray, and had great patches of
yellow lichen on their walls and roofs; thin rims of starved-looking grass
edged the streets, and stray blades stood up here and there among the old
sunken cobble-stones which made the pavements.

The streets seemed deserted; the silence and the sombre color, and the
strange low plashing of the water against the wharves, oppressed even
Draxy's enthusiastic heart. Her face fell, and she exclaimed
involuntarily, "Oh, what a lonesome place!" Checking herself, she added,
"but it's only the twilight makes it look so, I expect."

They had some difficulty in finding the house. The lanes and streets
seemed inextricably tangled; the little party was shy of asking direction,
and they were all disappointed and grieved, more than they owned to
themselves, that they had not been met at the station. At last they found
the house. Timidly Draxy lifted the great brass knocker. It looked to her
like splendor, and made her afraid. It fell more heavily than she supposed
it would, and the clang sounded to her over-wrought nerves as if it filled
the whole street. No one came. They looked at the windows. The curtains
were all down. There was no sign of life about the place. Tears came into
Jane's eyes. She was worn out with the fatigue of the journey.

"Oh dear, oh dear," she said, "I wish we hadn't come."

"Pshaw, mother," said Reuben, with a voice cheerier than his heart, "very
likely they never got our last letter, and don't know we were to be here
to-day," and he knocked again.

Instantly a window opened in the opposite house, and a jolly voice