'twouldn't work if the ordinary brand of canned
lobster was running it, but with ME to jerk the lever and sound the loud
timbrel--why, say! it's like stealing money from a blind cripple that's
hard of hearing."

"Yes, I know," says Cap'n Jonadab. "But this ain't like starting the Old
Home House. That was opening up a brand-new kind of hotel that nobody
ever heard of before. This is peddling weather prophecies when there's
the Gov'ment Weather Bureau running opposition--not to mention the Old
Farmer's Almanac, and I don't know how many more," he says.

Brown took his patent leathers down off the rail of the piazza, give the
ashes of his cigar a flip--he knocked 'em into my hat that was on the
floor side of his chair, but he was too excited to mind--and he says:

"Confound it, man!" he says. "You can throw more cold water than a
fire-engine. Old Farmer's Almanac! This isn't any 'About this time
look out for snow' business. And it ain't any Washington cold slaw like
'Weather for New England and Rocky Mountains, Tuesday to Friday; cold to
warm; well done on the edges with a rare streak in the middle, preceded
or followed by rain, snow, or clearing. Wind, north to south, varying
east and west.' No siree! this is TO-DAY'S weather for Cape Cod, served
right off the griddle on a hot plate, and cooked by the chef at that.
You don't realize what a regular dime-museum wonder that feller is," he
says.

Well, I suppose we didn't. You see, Jonadab and me, like the rest of the
folks around Wellmouth, had come to take Beriah Crocker and his weather
notions as the regular thing, like baked beans on a Saturday night.
Beriah, he--

But there! I've been sailing stern first. Let's get her headed right, if
we ever expect to turn the first mark. You see, 'twas this way:

'Twas in the early part of May follering the year that the "Old Home
House" was opened. We'd had the place all painted up, decks holy-stoned,
bunks overhauled, and one thing or 'nother, and the "Old Home" was all
taut and shipshape, ready for the crew--boarders, I mean. Passages was
booked all through the summer and it looked as if our second season
would be better'n our first.

Then the Dillaway girl--she was christened Lobelia, like her mother,
but she'd painted it out and cruised under the name of Belle since the
family got rich--she thought 'twould be nice to have what she called a
"spring house-party" for her particular friends 'fore the regular season
opened. S