other got a chance for my husband to go
as supercargo, being a good accountant, and came one day to urge him to
take it; he was very ill-disposed to the sea, but he had met with
losses, and I saw my own opportunity and persuaded them both to let me
go too. In those days they did n't object to a woman's being aboard to
wash and mend, the voyages were sometimes very long. And that was the
way I come to see the Queen."

Mrs. Martin was looking straight in my eyes to see if I showed any
genuine interest in the most interesting person in the world.

"Oh, I am very glad you saw the Queen," I hastened to say. "Mrs. Todd
has told me that you and she were born the very same day."

"We were indeed, dear!" said Mrs. Martin, and she leaned back
comfortably and smiled as she had not smiled before. Mrs. Todd gave a
satisfied nod and glance, as if to say that things were going on as
well as possible in this anxious moment.

"Yes," said Mrs. Martin again, drawing her chair a little nearer, "'t
was a very remarkable thing; we were born the same day, and at exactly
the same hour, after you allowed for all the difference in time. My
father figured it out sea-fashion. Her Royal Majesty and I opened our
eyes upon this world together; say what you may, 't is a bond between
us."

Mrs. Todd assented with an air of triumph, and untied her hat-strings
and threw them back over her shoulders with a gallant air.

"And I married a man by the name of Albert, just the same as she did,
and all by chance, for I did n't get the news that she had an Albert
too till a fortnight afterward; news was slower coming then than it is
now. My first baby was a girl, and I called her Victoria after my
mate; but the next one was a boy, and my husband wanted the right to
name him, and took his own name and his brother Edward's, and pretty
soon I saw in the paper that the little Prince o' Wales had been
christened just the same. After that I made excuse to wait till I knew
what she 'd named her children. I did n't want to break the chain, so
I had an Alfred, and my darling Alice that I lost long before she lost
hers, and there I stopped. If I 'd only had a dear daughter to stay at
home with me, same's her youngest one, I should have been so thankful!
But if only one of us could have a little Beatrice, I 'm glad 't was
the Queen; we 've both seen trouble, but she 's had the most care."

I asked Mrs. Martin if she lived alone all the year, and was told t