boats. A silence fell on the company.

It was broken by Calvin Green.

"A man was telling me rather a curious story, the other night," he said. "I was just explaining to him exactly how 't was that David Prince lost his money, and so he told this:—

"There was a boy that was clerk in a store, and one day they sent him over to the bank to git some money. It was before the war, and the bank gave him twenty ten-dollar gold pieces. But when he got back to the store there was one short. The boy hadn't nothin' to say. He admitted he had n't dropped none, because he 'd put 'em in a leather bag where he could n't lose one without he lost all, and the cashier knew he had n't made any mistake. The storekeeper he heard the story, and then he put his hand on the boy's shoulder, and says he, 'I don't know what to make o' this; but I believe this boy,' says he, 'and we 'll just drop it, and say no more about it.' So it run along, and the next day that it rained, one of the clerks in the store took down an old umberella, and, come to unfurl it, out falls a ten-dollar gold piece. Seems that the boy had that umberella that day, and hooked it on to the counter in the bank, by the handle, and one of the coins must have slid off into it when he was countin' 'em, and then he probably did n't spread the umberella coming back. And, as this man said that was telling me, it don't do to bet too much on suspicion. Now, only for that Jew's being such a hard character, according to the newspapers, I should be loath to charge him with taking David's money; I should say David might have lost it somewhere else."

Nobody spoke. Captain Bennett whistled softly.

"I never felt so bad in my life," continued Green, "as I did when he missed his money. When we come up into the depot he was telling me a kind of a comical story about old Jim Torrey, how he wanted to find out if all his hens was laying, or if any of 'em was disposed to shirk, and he got him a pass-book ruled in columns, and opened a ledger account with every hen, by a name he give her; and we got up to the ticket-window, and he put his hand into his breast-pocket for his wallet—by George! I 've seen him chaff and joke, sort of quiet, when we was going to ride under every minute; but he turned as white then as that new mainsail, and off he went, like a shot But 't was no use. Of course, the jewelry feller would n't disgorge on David's say-so, without no proof."

"It was like this," he went on; "the counter was here,—and David stood here,—and I was here,—and we both come off together. But I tell you,—the way David looked when he put in his hand for his wallet! He stopped laughing, as if he see a ghost; I can't get it out of my head. And how the man that stole the money can stand it I can't figure out."

"Perhaps he 's calloused," said the Deacon, "by what the paper said the other night about his buying a parcel of clothes hooked out of some man's entry. We concluded 'twas the same man—by the name."

"Can't believe all that's in the paper," said Perez Todd; "you know the paper had me to be married, once; the boys put it in for fun; they made up the name for the female, I guess, for I 've been kind of shyin' round for her this ten year, and have n't seen no such woman."

"Yes, sir, he's a hard ticket," said Green; "that's so, every time. Well, I must be going; I agreed to go and help Elbridge over at half flood."

"Half flood about five," said Captain Bennett; "you have n't any great time to spare."

Green went to the shore, rattled a skiff down over the beach to the water, and pulled away, with quick, short strokes. First the skiff was cut off from sight by the marsh-bank; then the rower's head alone was seen above the tall brown grasses; and then he pulled around the bend and was lost to view behind a mass of flaming woodbine; and still, in the distance, could be heard across the water the rattle of his oars in the thole-pins.

"Well, Silas?" said Captain Bennett.

"Well?" said Uncle Silas.

"Oh! I 've nothing to say," said Captain Bennett

"Nor I," said Uncle Silas.

"Calvin's always seemed to be a good-hearted fellow," said Captain Philo, "since he's lived here."

"Oh, yes," said Captain Bennett; "seems to feel for David surprisingly. Told me all about the losing of the money, told my wife, told my boy, told Uncle Joe, told our minister, told the Doctor, told Zimri Cobb, told Cyrus Bass, told Captain John Wells, told Patrick Coan; and proves it out to 'em all that 't was the Jew that did it."

"Kind of zealous, like the Apostle Paul supplying the pulpit to the Gentiles," said the Deacon; "won't let alone of a man, till he gives in 't the Hebrew's in the wrong."

"But I 've nothing to say," said Captain Bennett.

"Oh, no, nor I," said Uncle Silas.

From the distance, borne on the gentle breeze, a click as even as a pulse-beat came faintly over the water.

"He may be a good-hearted fellow," said the Deacon, "but I don't know as I hanker to be the man that's pulling that skiff. But then,—that may be simply and solely because I prefer a hair-cloth rocker to a skiff."

"Delia," said David Prince to his wife, one afternoon, "Calvin Green has bought four tickets to that stereopticon show that's going to be in the West Church to-night, and he gave me two, for you and me."

"I don't want his tickets," she replied, ironing away at the sunny window.

"Now, what's the use of talking that way?" said her husband, "as much as to say—"

"I have my opinion," she said.

"Well," said her husband, "I think it's a hard way to use a man, just because he happened to be by when I lost my money."

"I 'll tell you," said Delia, stopping her work; "we will go, and all I 'll say is this—you see if after the lecture's over he does n't find a text in it to talk about our money. Now, you just wait and see—that's all."

"Ladies and gentlemen," said the lecturer, standing by a great circle of light thrown on the wall, behind the pulpit, "I have now, with a feeling of awe befitting this sacred place, thus given you, in the first part of my lecture, a succinct view of the origin, rise, and growth of the globe on which, as the poet has justly said, 'we dwell.' I have shown you—corroborating Scripture—the earth, without form and void, the awful monsters of the Silurian age, and Man in the Garden of Eden.

"I now invite you to journey with me—as one has said—'across the continent.'

"Travelling has ever been viewed as a means of education. Thus Athenian sages sought the learning of the Orient. Thus may we this evening, without toil or peril, or expense beyond the fifteen cents already incurred for the admission-fee, journey in spirit from the wild Atlantic to the sunset coast. In the words of the sacred lyrist, Edgar A. Poe, 'My country, 't is of thee,' that I shall now display some views.

"Of course we start from Boston. On the way to New York, we will first pause to view the scene where Putnam galloped down a flight of steps, beneath the hostile fire. See both mane and coat-tails flying in the wind, and the eyes of steed and rider wildly dilated with excitement.

"Next we pause in Brooklyn. And from my immense variety of scenes in the City of Churches, I choose the firemen's monument in Greenwood Cemetery.