igh ground-glass now," he answered, "but it wa'n't
when it was put in. The sand did that. It blows like all possessed when
there's a gale on."

"Do you mean that those windows were ground that way by the beach sand
blowing against them?" asked Ralph, astonished.

"Sartin. Git a good no'therly wind comin' up the beach and it fetches
the sand with it. Mighty mean stuff to face, sand blowin' like that is;
makes you think you're fightin' a nest of yaller-jackets."

With the telescope in the cupola they could see for miles up and down
the beach and out to sea. An ocean tug bound toward Boston was passing,
and Elsie, looking through the glass, saw the cook come out of the
galley, empty a pan over the side, and go back again.

"Let me look through that a minute," said Captain Eri, when the rest had
had their turn. He swung the glass around until it pointed toward their
home away up the shore.

"Perez," he called anxiously, "look here quick!"

Captain Perez hastily put his eye to the glass, and his friend went on:

"You see our house?" he said. "Yes; well, you see the dinin'-room door.
Notice that chair by the side of it?"

"Yes, what of it?"

"Well, that's the rocker that Elsie made the velvet cushion for. I want
you to look at the upper southeast corner of that cushion, and see if
there ain't a cat's hair there. Lorenzo's possessed to sleep in that
chair, and--"

"Oh, you git out!" indignantly exclaimed Captain Perez, straightening
up.

"Well, it was a pretty important thing, and I wanted to make sure. I
left that chair out there, and I knew what I'd catch if any cat's hairs
got on that cushion while I was gone. Ain't that so, Mrs. Snow?"

The housekeeper expressed her opinion that Captain Eri was a "case,"
whatever that may be.

They had clam chowder for dinner--a New England clam chowder, made with
milk and crackers, and clams with shells as white as snow. They were
what the New Yorker calls "soft-shell" clams, for a Fulton Market
chowder is a "quahaug soup" to the native of the Cape.

Now that chowder was good; everybody said so, and if the proof of the
chowder, like that of the pudding, is in the eating of it, this one had
a clear case. Also, there were boiled striped bass, which is good enough
for anybody, hot biscuits, pumpkin pie, and beach-plum preserves. There
was a running fire of apologies from Miss Patience and answering volleys
of compliments from Mrs. Snow.

"I don't see how you make sech beac