ad article good, while it is likely to make a good one look bad.

Even the flags of a yacht have each a meaning, and are not mere patches
of pretty colours. Therefore they ought to be made, at all events,
perfectly correct first, and then as pretty and neat as you please. I
examined the flags of all the boats and yachts and steamers at the
Exhibition; and there was wonderfully little taste in their display;
nearly every one--English and foreign--was cut wrong, or coloured wrong,
or too large for the boat that carried them. Even our Admiralty Barge,
where specimens of boats from England were exhibited, had a flag flying,
with the stripes in the 'jack' quite wrong. She was the only craft on
that side of the Pont de Jena; but as it was the English side I anchored
there, right opposite the sloping sward of the Exhibition, and I did this
without asking any questions, for it is best now and then to do right
things at once, and not to delay until time is wasted in proving them to
be right.

Here I slept on board my little craft in perfect comfort, and could spend
all the rest of the day on shore. Each morning about 7 o'clock you might
notice a smart-looking French policeman standing on the grass bank of the
Exhibition, and staring hard at the Rob Roy. He had come to see her
captain at his somewhat airy toilette, and he was particularly
interested, and even amazed, to witness the evolutions of a toothbrush,
which were not only interesting but instructive as involving an idea
perfectly new--hard also to comprehend from so distant an inspection.
Surely he thought this strange implement must be a novelty imported from
England for exhibition here.

As he gazed in wonder at the rapid exercise, I sometimes gave the curious
instrument an extra flourish above or below, and the intelligent and
courteous gendarme never rightly decided whether or not the toothbrush
was an essential though inscrutable part of the yacht's sailing gear.
Our acquaintance, however, improved, and he kindly took charge of the
boat in my absence; not without a mysterious air as he recounted its
travels (and a good deal more), to the numerous visitors,--many of whom,
after his explanations, left the Rob Roy quite delighted that they had
seen "the little ship which had sailed from America!"

The boat "Red, White, and Blue" he thus confounded with mine--was at that
time not far off, in a house by itself, amid the other wonders which
crowded the gardens of t