make me ill. Do you suppose I go on eating them? That would
be too foolish! Yet men are supposed to have more strength and
self-control than women."

The attache drew up a chair and dropped into it, not loth to linger,
even to be lectured.

"I don't think men have more of such strength though," he said. "Their
superiority is physical, not mental."

"They ought to be ashamed to own it!" cried Faith. "The two should go
together."

"Well, we are ashamed--_I_ am ashamed!" smiling upon her. "Yet we are
willing to give you girls all the credit you like for your decision of
character, only caring to retain just a little vanity on account of our
own endurance in other ways. And you'll have to own there isn't one of
you who likes a Molly Coddle!"

"Is it being a Molly Coddle to be strong and true to yourself?"

"Oh, well, you put it nicely, but just look at the fellows who will sit
by and never join in the wine and the fun--aren't they a rather
feeble-looking set?"

"Is my father feeble?" asked Faith, turning such a sweetly arch and
tender face upon him that the young man felt his heart thump.

"Well no--hardly!" he laughed.

"Yet he knows enough to leave all liquor alone, and believes himself
the stronger for it. And don't you, yourself, feel a bit safer on
board this steamer, to know he can perfectly control himself?"

Allyne tapped his chair arm and ruminated.

"_He_ certainly is no Molly Coddle!" he observed, finally, with a vivid
remembrance of the captain's stern visage and curt manner upon a
certain uncomfortable occasion. "I think I never looked at the matter
quite in this light before, Miss Hosmer. Nearly every one I meet takes
wine, and I've been disgusted with myself that I couldn't keep my head
so long as others did when drinking. It never occurred to me to keep
my head by not drinking at all! That's worth considering. Thank you
for a kind word and good thought!"

"You are welcome!" smiled the girl rising. "And I'll leave you to
digest it while I go and read to Mrs. Blakely."

"Mrs. Blakely! That old lady with the green goggles?"

"Yes."

"What, in goodness' name do you find to admire in her? I thought she
was a cranky old invalid."

"Well, she is not very young, nor handsome, nor pleasant, and she has
trouble with her eyes--but that's just why I do read to her. Now, nice
strong people with good eyes, and manners--like yourself, for instance,
don't need such attention. You can a