Cap'n Dan's Daughter

had done a good deal of the first ever since he was sixteen years old; the second

very detail. The flag on the cable station across the bay stood out stiff in the steady breeze, and one might almost count the stripes. The pines on Signal Hill were a bright green patch against the

ptain Eri, a

. "How is it you ain't off

ket," was the answer. "How

ette-smoking villain of the melodrama used to love to call it. To tell the truth, petticoat government was wearing on him. The marriage agreement, to which his partners considered him bound, and which he saw no way to evade, hung ove

han any young lady he had ever seen. The trouble was, that between the

le change. But it was but one. He didn't like muslin curtains in his bedroom, because they were a nuisance when he wanted to sit up in bed and look out of the window; but the curtains were put there, and everybody else seemed to think them beautiful, so he could not protest. Captain Perez and Captain Eri had taken to "dre

that if this could be done the pair would live somewhere else, even though John Baxter was still too ill to be moved. Elsie could come in every day, but she would be too busy

nd Elsie, and their obvious fitness for each other. Captain Perez liked the scheme well enough, provided it could be carried out.

ous winks to his messmates, would announce that he guessed he would "take a little walk," or "go out to the barn," or something similar. Captai

been so startlingly successful as to warrant his feeling much elated. Ralph and Elsie were good fri

smoked and pondered. He hid his discouragement, however, and in response to Cap

of course, but you can't expect nothin' diff'rent. I

aptain Eri, "I do

ore that 'twas only three.

rti

ped after a drink of water neith

Call it a ha'f a time. That would ma

t his friend's face, but its sobern

afore, it's comin' along, and I have the sat

when to come down to the life-savin' station and stay to dinner. His sister Pashy-the old maid one-is down there, and it's such a fine day I thought I'd take Perez and Elsie and Mrs. Snow and, maybe, Hazeltine along. Somebody's

telephone at the station, so that news of a change in the patient's condition could be sent almost immediately. Under these conditions, and as Captain Jerry was certain to take good care of their charge, the two were persuaded to go. Perez took the dory and

all, and then at those who

n," he said. "I don't see how five o

huckle, "when I was consid'rable younger 'n I am now. Squeezin' didn't count in them days, 'specially if the girls wanted to go to camp-meetin'. I cal'late we can fix it. You

y large, and how Captain Perez, in spite of his alleged elasticity, managed to find room be

se I'm kind of hangin' on t

cking up the reins. "All ashore that's goin' ash

five in a carryall is nothing out of the ordinary. They turned into the "cliff road," the finest thoroughfare in town, kept in good condition for the benefit of the cottagers and the boarders

coal barges behind it was so close in that they could make out the connecting hawsers. A black freight steamer was pus

" inquired Captain Eri, pointing to th

nd peered from under his hand.

ged for'ard looks like Johnny

e to notice it. Can you make out he

eyes have you got? I couldn't tell whether she ha

nails," replied Captain Eri. "When you're at sea you've jest got to git us

s on deck, and they sighted a steamer a good ways off. The skipper spied her and see she was flyin' the United States flag. But when Nate got the glass he took one look and says, 'That Yankee buntin' don't b'long over that English hull,' he says. You see he knew she was English bu

wn to the beach beneath the lighthouse bluff. The lifesaving station was in plain sight now, b

in Eri, "here's where

e?" queried E

. Git dap, Daniel! What are you waitin

re low tide to three hours after, one may reach the outer beach at this point by driving over in an ordinary vehicle. Th

ingly emerged on the other side. "I thought I'd done about everything

d wound between sand dunes, riven and heaped in all sorts of queer shapes by the wind, and with clumps of the persevering beach grass clinging to their tops like the last treas

s loose over here; tears out a big chunk of beach and makes a cut-through one season, and fills in a deep hole and builds a new shoal the next. I've heard m

here was a small stable and a henhouse and yard just behind it. Captain Da

odd coming from such a deep chest. "I'm mighty glad to see you, too? Ju

one as a comfortable sort of person. Captain Eri did the honors and ev

as the sunlight from the window struck it. The floor was white from scouring. There were shelves on the walls and on

ptain Davis introduced them, one after the other. Perhaps the most striking characteristic of these men was the quiet, al

-saving station afor

had and so had Mrs. S

Davis, opening a door and leading the way into a large, low-studded room

ins and their sou'westers. The Captain pointed out one thing after another, the cork jackets and life-preservers, the

antucket lady decidedly, referring to the buoy. "I don't know b

ew schooner jest off the stocks. Struck on the Hog's Back off here and then drifted close in and struck again. We got 'em all, the woman fust. Th

n's sleeping rooms and then up

this side of the house?" asked Elsie, a

Davis

d, "but it wa'n't when it was put in. The sand did tha

ound that way by the beach sand blowing

hes the sand with it. Mighty mean stuff to face, sand blowin' like

to sea. An ocean tug bound toward Boston was passing, and Elsie, looking through the g

hen the rest had had their turn. He swung the glass arou

ed anxiously, "l

ut his eye to the glass

well, you see the dinin'-room door.

what o

u to look at the upper southeast corner of that cushion, and see if there

nantly exclaimed Captain

left that chair out there, and I knew what I'd catch if any cat's h

opinion that Captain Eri was a

rs, and clams with shells as white as snow. They were what the New Yorker calls "soft-

his one had a clear case. Also, there were boiled striped bass, which is good enough for anybody, hot biscuits, pumpkin pie, and b

exclaimed the lady from Nantucket. "I declare! I'm goin' to ask

be put up when they're jest so, else they ain't good for much. I was at Luther for I don't know how long 'fore I could git him to go over to th

he female portion of the company washed the dishes, while the men walked up and down the beach and smoked. Here they were joined aft

mbled to pieces in a roaring tumult of white and green. The gulls skimmed along their tops or dropped l

Davis, his reserve vanishing before the tactful inquiries