amboat doctors, for the
_Scarrowmania_ was taking out an unusual number of passengers, and there
were two of them. They were immaculate in blue uniform, and looked very
clean and English by contrast with the mass of frowsy aliens. Beside
them stood another official, presumably acting on behalf of the Dominion
Government, though there were few restrictions imposed upon Canadian
immigration then, nor, for that matter, did anybody trouble much about
the comfort of the steerage passengers. Each steamer carried as many as
she could hold.

As the stream poured out of the gangway, the doctor glanced at each
newcomer's face, and then seizing him by the wrist uncovered it. Then he
looked at the official, who made a sign, and the man moved on. Since
this took him two or three seconds, one could have fancied that he
either possessed peculiar powers, or that the test was a somewhat
inefficient one.

A group of first-class passengers, leaning on the thwartship rails close
by, looked on, with complacent satisfaction or half-contemptuous pity.
Among them stood Mrs. Hastings, Miss Winifred Rawlinson, and Agatha. It
was noticed that Wyllard, with a pipe in his hand, sat on a hatch
forward, near the head of the gangway. Agatha drew Mrs. Hastings'
attention to it.

"Whatever is Mr. Wyllard doing there?" she asked.

Mrs. Hastings, who was wrapped in furs, to protect her from the sting in
the east wind, smiled at her.

"That," she answered, "is more than I can tell you; but Harry Wyllard
seems to find an interest in what other folks would consider most
unpromising things, and, what is more to the purpose, he is rather
addicted to taking a hand in them. It is a habit that costs him
something now and then."

Agatha asked nothing further. She was interested in Wyllard, but she was
at the moment more interested in the faces of those who swarmed on
board. She wondered what the emigrants had endured in the lands that had
cast them out; and what they might still have to bear. It seemed to her
that the murmur of their harsh voices went up in a great protest, an
inarticulate cry of sorrow. While she looked on the doctor held back a
long-haired man who, shuffling in broken boots, was following a haggard
woman. The physician drew him aside, and after he had consulted with the
other official, two seamen hustled the man towards a second gangway that
led to the tug. The woman raised a wild, despairing cry. She blocked the
passage, and a quarter-m