she could no more have
asked him a question about it than if she had been born dumb. She
decided that she should never show him this poetry--it might make him
feel unhappy.

One bright afternoon, when the sea lay all dead asleep, and the long,
steady respiration of its tides scarcely disturbed the glassy
tranquillity of its bosom, Mrs. Pennel sat at her kitchen-door spinning,
when Captain Kittridge appeared.

"Good afternoon, Mis' Pennel; how ye gettin' along?"

"Oh, pretty well, Captain; won't you walk in and have a glass of beer?"

"Well, thank you," said the Captain, raising his hat and wiping his
forehead, "I be pretty dry, it's a fact."

Mrs. Pennel hastened to a cask which was kept standing in a corner of
the kitchen, and drew from thence a mug of her own home-brewed, fragrant
with the smell of juniper, hemlock, and wintergreen, which she presented
to the Captain, who sat down in the doorway and discussed it in
leisurely sips.

"Wal', s'pose it's most time to be lookin' for 'em home, ain't it?" he
said.

"I _am_ lookin' every day," said Mrs. Pennel, involuntarily glancing
upward at the sea.

At the word appeared the vision of little Mara, who rose up like a
spirit from a dusky corner, where she had been stooping over her
reading.

"Why, little Mara," said the Captain, "you ris up like a ghost all of a
sudden. I thought you's out to play. I come down a-purpose arter you.
Mis' Kittridge has gone shoppin' up to Brunswick, and left Sally a
'stent' to do; and I promised her if she'd clap to and do it quick, I'd
go up and fetch you down, and we'd have a play in the cove."

Mara's eyes brightened, as they always did at this prospect, and Mrs.
Pennel said, "Well, I'm glad to have the child go; she seems so kind o'
still and lonesome since Moses went away; really one feels as if that
boy took all the noise there was with him. I get tired myself sometimes
hearing the clock tick. Mara, when she's alone, takes to her book more
than's good for a child."

"She does, does she? Well, we'll see about that. Come, little Mara, get
on your sun-bonnet. Sally's sewin' fast as ever she can, and we're goin'
to dig some clams, and make a fire, and have a chowder; that'll be nice,
won't it? Don't you want to come, too, Mis' Pennel?"

"Oh, thank you, Captain, but I've got so many things on hand to do afore
they come home, I don't really think I can. I'll trust Mara to you any
day."

Mara had run into her own little room an