waiting for the snow to come. There was nobody loitering on the wharves,
and when we went down the street we walked fast, arm in arm, to keep
warm. The houses were shut up as close as possible, and the old sailors
did not seem cheery any longer; they looked forlorn, and it was not a
pleasant prospect to be so long weather-bound in port. If they ventured
out, they put on ancient great-coats, with huge flaps to the pockets and
large horn buttons, and they looked contemptuously at the vane, which
always pointed to the north or east. It felt like winter, and the
captains rolled more than ever as they walked, as if they were on deck
in a heavy sea. The rheumatism claimed many victims, and there was one
day, it must be confessed, when a biting, icy fog was blown in-shore,
that Kate and I were willing to admit that we could be as comfortable in
town, and it was almost time for sealskin jackets.

In the front yards we saw the flower-beds black with frost, except a few
brave pansies which had kept green and had bloomed under the tall
china-aster stalks, and one day we picked some of these little flowers
to put between the leaves of a book and take away with us. I think we
loved Deephaven all the more in those last days, with a bit of
compassion in our tenderness for the dear old town which had so little
to amuse it. So long a winter was coming, but we thought with a sigh how
pleasant it would be in the spring.

You would have smiled at the treasures we brought away with us. We had
become so fond of even our fishing-lines; and this very day you may see
in Kate's room two great bunches of Deephaven cat-o'-nine-tails. They
were much in our way on the journey home, but we clung affectionately to
these last sheaves of our harvest.

The morning we came away our friends were all looking out from door or
window to see us go by, and after we had passed the last house and there
was no need to smile any longer, we were very dismal. The sun was
shining again bright and warm as if the Indian summer were beginning,
and we wished that it had been a rainy day.

The thought of Deephaven will always bring to us our long quiet summer
days, and reading aloud on the rocks by the sea, the fresh salt air, and
the glory of the sunsets; the wail of the Sunday psalm-singing at
church, the yellow lichen that grew over the trees, the houses, and the
stone-walls; our boating and wanderings ashore; our importance as
members of society, and how kind ever