n a flutter of exultation. "Did you ever know any one
so clever as Marion?" she inquired, with quite the air of an elderly
person accustomed to judge intellects. "We knew she could do anything
with Mr. Cassall, but we never expected this. And now, Mr. Ferrier, you
won't go and get drowned in nasty cabins any more, and you'll have your
sailors all under your eye, and no more degenerate sea-sick ladies to
plague you. Why, now we've made a start, we must capture some more
millionaires, and we'll have a vessel with every fleet, and no sick men
lying on grimy floors. By the way, what a capital association that would
be--The Royal Society for the Capture of Millionaires. President and
Organizing Director, Marion Dearsley; Treasurer, Lena Ranken; General
Agent for Great Britain and the Colonies, Lewis Ferrier! Wouldn't that
be splendid? I begin to feel quite like an administrator."

This was the very longest speech that Miss Ranken was ever known to
make, and she was applauded for her remarkable excursion into practical
affairs.

"You must tell us a little more about your winter, Mr. Ferrier. Lena
hasn't heard half enough," observed the stately "little jilt" when the
cataract of Miss Ranken's eloquence had ceased flowing.

"Better wait until the meeting, Miss Dearsley. Then, if you are
satisfied, I may be able to do something in different places."

"But you will tell us how Tom Betts fared in the end?"

"He was well and at work when we left his fleet, and he had established
a sort of elaborate myth, with you as central figure. I'm afraid you
would never recognize your own doings if you heard his version of them.
Tom's imagination is distinctly active. We had no bad mishaps with our
men, but it was a dreadful time."

"I think you seem to be more solemn and older than when you went away
first, Mr. Ferrier," remarked the Treasurer of the Capturers.

"One ages fast there; I really lived a good deal. One life isn't enough
for that work. I suppose the Englishmen began working on the Banks two
hundred years ago, and we have all that time of neglect to make up."

"Yes. I wonder now what was the use of our ancestors. My brother says
that no philosopher has ever discovered the ultimate uses of babies; I
wonder if any one can tell the uses of those blundering, silly old
ancestors of ours. As far as I can see, we have to put up with all sorts
of horrid things, and you have to go and get wet on dirty fishing-boats,
just because our