lings become fewer and fewer, until at last the village blends
into a long stretch of sandy coast and scrubby pine-woods. Eastward
the village ends abruptly at the foot of a windswept bluff, on which no
one cares to build.

Among the last houses in the western end of the village stood two neat,
substantial dwellings, one belonging to Captain Eli Bunker, and the
other to Captain Cephas Dyer. These householders were two very
respectable retired mariners, the first a widower about fifty, and the
other a bachelor of perhaps the same age, a few years more or less
making but little difference in this region of weather-beaten youth and
seasoned age.

Each of these good captains lived alone, and each took entire charge of
his own domestic affairs, not because he was poor, but because it
pleased him to do so. When Captain Eli retired from the sea he was the
owner of a good vessel, which he sold at a fair profit; and Captain
Cephas had made money in many a voyage before he built his house in
Sponkannis and settled there.

When Captain Eli's wife was living she was his household manager. But
Captain Cephas had never had a woman in his house, except during the
first few months of his occupancy, when certain female neighbors came
in occasionally to attend to little matters of cleaning which,
according to popular notions, properly belong to the sphere of woman.

But Captain Cephas soon put an end to this sort of thing. He did not
like a woman's ways, especially her ways of attending to domestic
affairs. He liked to live in sailor fashion, and to keep house in
sailor fashion. In his establishment everything was shipshape, and
everything which could be stowed away was stowed away, and, if
possible, in a bunker. The floors were holystoned nearly every day,
and the whole house was repainted about twice a year, a little at a
time, when the weather was suitable for this marine recreation. Things
not in frequent use were lashed securely to the walls, or perhaps put
out of the way by being hauled up to the ceiling by means of blocks and
tackle. His cooking was done sailor fashion, like everything else, and
he never failed to have plum-duff on Sunday. His well was near his
house, and every morning he dropped into it a lead and line, and noted
down the depth of water. Three times a day he entered in a little
note-book the state of the weather, the height of the mercury in
barometer and thermometer, the direction of the wind, an