or instance. I noticed, this afternoon, when I was most
sea-sick, that your fellow took off his hat and pulled something out
of the lining. I was too ill to see what it was; but he dropped it
overboard the next minute and muttered something."

"Oh, you remarked that, did you?"

"Yes, and meant to ask him about it afterwards; but forgot, somehow."

"Do you remember where we were--what we were passing--when he did
this?"

"Not clearly. I was infernally ill just then. Why did he do it?"

I was silent.

"I suppose it had some meaning?" he went on.

"Yes, it had. And excuse me when I say that I'm hanged if either you
or your Constant Readers shall know what that meaning was. My dear
fellow, you belong to a strong race--a race that has beaten us and
taken toll of us, and now carves 'Smith' and 'Thompson' and such names
upon our fathers' tombs. But there are some things you have not laid
hands on yet; secrets that we all know somehow, but never utter, even
among ourselves, nor allude to. If I told you what Billy Tredegar did
to-day, and why he did it, I tell you frankly your article would
make some thousands of Constant Readers open wide eyes over their
breakfast-cups. But you won't know. Why, after all, should I say
anything to spoil Cornwall's prospects as a health-resort?"

My friend took this very quietly, merely observing that it was rather
late in the day to take sides against Hengist and Horsa. But he was
sorry, I could see, to lose his local colour. And as I looked down,
for the last time that night, upon Troy, this petition escaped me--

"O my country, if I keep your secrets, keep for me your heart!"

THE SPINSTER'S MAYING.

"_The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet,
Young lovers meet, old wives a-sunning sit;
In every street these tunes our ears do greet--
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-wee, to-witta-woo!
Spring, the sweet Spring_."

At two o'clock on May morning a fishing-boat, with a small row-boat in
tow, stole up the harbour between the lights of the vessels that lay
at anchor. She came on a soundless tide, with her sprit-mainsail
wide and drawing, and her foresail flapping idle; and although her
cuddy-top and gunwale glistened wet with a recent shower, the man who
steered her looked over his shoulder at the waning moon, and decided
that the dawn would be a fine one. A furlong below the Town Quay he
left the tiller and lowered sail: two furlongs abov