bout it," and they laughed together. "But I talked so much
with people after we decided to go, that I feel as if I had been a
hundred times."

"I know," said the other lady, with caressing intelligence. "That is
just the way with--" She stopped, and looked at the young man whom the
head steward was bringing up to take the vacant place next to March. He
came forward, stuffing his cap into the pocket of his blue serge sack,
and smiled down on the company with such happiness in his gay eyes that
March wondered what chance at this late day could have given any human
creature his content so absolute, and what calamity could be lurking
round the corner to take it out of him. The new-comer looked at March as
if he knew him, and March saw at a second glance that he was the young
fellow who had told him about the mother put off after the start. He
asked him whether there was any change in the weather yet outside, and
he answered eagerly, as if the chance to put his happiness into the mere
sound of words were a favor done him, that their ship had just spoken
one of the big Hanseatic mailboats, and she had signalled back that she
had met ice; so that they would probably keep a southerly course, and
not have it cooler till they were off the Banks.

The mother of the boy said, "I thought we must be off the Banks when I
came out of my room, but it was only the electric fan at the foot of the
stairs."

"That was what I thought," said Mrs. March. "I almost sent my husband
back for my shawl!" Both the ladies laughed and liked each other for
their common experience.

The gentleman at the head of the table said, "They ought to have fans
going there by that pillar, or else close the ports. They only let in
heat."

They easily conformed to the American convention of jocosity in their
talk; it perhaps no more represents the individual mood than the
convention of dulness among other people; but it seemed to make the
young man feel at home.

"Why, do you think it's uncomfortably warm?" he asked, from what March
perceived to be a meteorology of his own. He laughed and added, "It is
pretty summerlike," as if he had not thought of it before. He talked
of the big mail-boat, and said he would like to cross on such a boat as
that, and then he glanced at the possible advantage of having your own
steam-yacht like the one which he said they had just passed, so near
that you could see what a good time the people were having on board.
He began to