and see places we've never seen before.'

'My dear girl,' said her mother, 'remember that Mr. Conneally and your
father aren't machines. You mustn't expect them to go too far.'

'Oh, but,' said Elsie, 'father says he never gets tired if he has only
one oar to pull.'

The Canon was preparing for his toil. The old coat, in colour now almost
olive green, was folded and used as a cushion by Marion in the bow. His
white cuffs, stowed inside his hat, were committed to the care of Mrs.
Beecher. He rolled his gray shirtsleeves up to the elbow, and unbuttoned
his waistcoat.

'Now,' he said, 'I'm ready. If I'm not hurried, I'll pull along all day.
But what about you, Conneally? You're not accustomed to this sort of
thing?'

But Hyacinth for once was self-confident. He might be a poor singer and
a contemptible tennis player, but he knew that nothing which had to do
with boats could come amiss to him. He looked across the sparkling water
of the lake.

'I'll go on as long as you like. You won't tire me when there's no tide
and no waves. This is a very different business from getting out the
sweeps to pull a nobby five miles against the strength of the ebb, with
a heavy ground swell running.'

About eleven o'clock they landed on an island and ate biscuits. The
Canon told Hyacinth the story of the ruin under whose walls they sat.

'It belonged to the Lynotts, the Welshmen of Tyrawley. They were at feud
with the Burkes, and one night in winter----'

The girls wandered away, carrying their biscuits with them. It is
likely that they had heard the story every summer as long as they could
remember. Mrs. Beecher alone still maintained an attitude of admiration
for her husband's antiquarian knowledge, the more creditable because she
must have been familiar with the onset of the MacWilliam Burkes before
even Marion was old enough to listen. To Hyacinth the story was both
new and interesting. It stirred him to think of the Lynotts fighting
hopelessly, or begging mercy in the darkness and the cold just where he
sat now saturate with sunlight and with life. He gazed across the mile
of shining water which separated the castle from the land, and tried to
realize how the Irish servant-girl swam from the island with an infant
Lynott on her back, and saved the name from perishing. How the snow must
have beaten in her face and the lake-waves choked her breath! It was a
great story, but the girls, shouting from the water's edge, reminded him