got to propound this day to
the judge and jury is--Why not?"

Upon mature consideration, the judge and jury could not answer "why
not?" therefore the thing was fixed and carried out and the captain
thereafter dwelt for years in the scullery, and the inmates of the
cottage spent so much of their time in the scullery that it became, as
it were, the parlour, or boudoir, or drawing-room of the place. When,
in course of time, a number of small Brands came to howl and tumble
about the cottage, they naturally gravitated towards the scullery, which
then virtually became the nursery, with a stout old seaman, of the name
of Ogilvy, usually acting the part of head nurse. His duties were
onerous, by reason of the strength of constitution, lungs, and muscles
of the young Brands, whose ungovernable desire to play with that
dangerous element from which heat is evolved, undoubtedly qualified them
for the honorary title of Fire-Brands.

With the proceeds of the jewel-case Ruby bought a little coasting
vessel, with which he made frequent and successful voyages. "Absence
makes the heart grow fonder," no doubt, for Minnie grew fonder of Ruby
every time he went away, and every time he came back. Things prospered
with our hero, and you may be sure that he did not forget his old
friends of the lighthouse. On the contrary, he and his wife became
frequent visitors at the signal-tower, and the families of the
lighthouse-keepers felt almost as much at home in "the cottage" as they
did in their own houses. And each keeper, on returning from his six
weeks' spell on the rock to take his two weeks' spell at the
signal-tower, invariably made it his first business, _after_ kissing his
wife and children, to go up to the Brands and smoke a pipe in the
scullery with that eccentric old seafaring nursery-maid of the name of
Ogilvy.

In time Ruby found it convenient to build a top flat on the cottage, and
above this a small turret, which overlooked the opposite houses, and
commanded a view of the sea. This tower the captain converted into a
point of lookout, and a summer smoking-room,--and many a time and oft,
in the years that followed, did he and Ruby climb up there about
nightfall, to smoke the pipe of peace, with Minnie beside them, and to
watch the bright flashing of the red and white light on the Bell Rock,
as it shone over the waters far and wide, like a star of the first
magnitude, a star of hope and safety, guiding sailors to their desired