, "I am sure I do not know. It cannot be horses or cattle, for
he has not enough of them to make such a venture profitable. And as to
sugar-cane, or anything from his farm, I am sure he has a good enough
market here for all he has to sell. Certainly he does not produce enough
to make it necessary for him to buy a ship in order to carry them away."

"It is opined," said Martin, "by the people of the town, that Major
Bonnet intends to become a commercial man, and to carry away to the
other islands, and perhaps to the old country itself, the goods of other
people."

"Now that would be fine!" said Mistress Kate, her eyes sparkling, "for I
should then surely go with him, and would see the world, and perhaps
London." And her face flushed with the prospect.

Martin's face did not flush. "But if your father's ship sailed on a long
voyage," he said, with a suspicion of apprehension, "he would not sail
with her; he would send her under the charge of others."

The girl shook her head. "When she sails," said she, "he sails in her.
If you had heard him talking as I have heard him, you would not doubt
that. And if he sails, I sail."

Martin's soul grew quite sad. There were very good reasons to believe
that this dear girl might sail away from Bridgetown, and from him. She
might come back to the town, but she might not come back to him.

"Mistress Kate," said he, looking very earnestly at her, "do you know
that such speech as this makes my heart sink? You know I love you, I
have told you so before. If you were to sail away, I care not to what
port, this world would be a black place for me."

"That is like a lover," she exclaimed a little pertly; "it is like them
all, every man of them. They must have what they want, and they must
have it, no matter who else may suffer."

He rose and stood by her.

"But I don't want you to suffer," he said. "Do you think it would be
suffering to live with one who loved you, who would spend his whole life
in making you happy, who would look upon you as the chief thing in the
world, and have no other ambition than to make himself worthy of you?"

She looked up at him with a little smile.

"That would, doubtless, be all very pleasant for you," she said, "and in
order that you might be pleased, you would have her give up so much.
That is the way with men! Now, here am I, born in the very end of the
last century, and having had, consequently, no good out of that, and
with but seventeen years in