for the doctor, but the
patient was not able to leave in the steamer, which went in the
afternoon. The landlord's wife nursed him carefully and kindly, and in a
week he began to improve. He had no further attack of bleeding, and he
began to hope that he should live to get home. As soon as he was able to
sit up in the bed, he resumed the writing up of the diary.

But we must leave him in his chamber thus occupied, to introduce the
most important character of our story.

He was a rather tall and quite stout young fellow of sixteen. He was
dressed in homely attire, what there was of it, for he wore no coat, and
his shirt sleeves were rolled up above his elbows, in order, apparently,
to give his arms more freedom. He was as tawny as the sailors of the
Waldo had been, tanned by the hot suns of the West Indies. He had just
come down the river from the principal wharf, at the head of which was
the fish market--a very important institution, where the product of the
sea formed a considerable portion of the food of the people. The boat in
which he sailed was an old, black, dingy affair, which needed to be
baled out more than once a day to keep her afloat. The sail was almost
as black as the hull, and had been patched and darned in a hundred
places. The skipper and crew of this unsightly old craft was Leopold
Bennington, the only son of the landlord of the Cliff House, though he
had three daughters.

Leopold carried the anchor of his boat far up on the rocks above the
beach, and thrust one of the arms down into a crevice, where it would
hold the boat. Taking from the dingy boat a basket which was heavy
enough to give a considerable curve to his spine as he carried it, he
climbed up the rocks to the street which extended along the shore of the
river for half a mile. On the opposite side of it was the Cliff House.
His father stood on the piazza of the house as the young man crossed the
street.

"Well, Leopold, what luck had you to-day?" asked Mr. Bennington, as his
son approached.

"First rate, father," replied the young man, as his bronzed face lighted
up with enthusiasm.

"What did you get?" asked the landlord.

"Mackerel."

"Mackerel!" exclaimed mine host, his face in turn lighting up with
pleasure.

"Lots of them, father."

"We have hardly seen a mackerel this year yet. I never knew them to be
so scarce since I have been on this coast."

"There hasn't been any caught before these for a month, and then only a
few