“Loose-haired, bare-footed, hand- n-hand,
Young girls went tripping down the sand ;
And youths and maidens sitting in the moon
Dreamed o'er the old fond dream, from which we wake too soon.”

. — Whittier.

THE four young men I mentioned in my last chapter as being our first boarders had turned out to be very pleasant, and gave us very little trouble. The next visitors to arrive were an elderly gentleman, his young wife, and the wife’s sister. The young wife was a pretty nonentity, but the sister was of a different stamp; she was tall, dark, and rather masculine looking, with a suspicion of a moustache; considerably older than her married sister. I soon found out she had an unpleasant habit of setting everybody down whenever she got the chance, which made me suspicious that she must be a school-ma’am. I felt sure she was; there is something about a school-ma’am everybody recognizes. I think they are so used to looking for faults in their scholars, and correcting them, that they are a little too apt to treat the people they meet in society in the same summary fashion. They all seem “to the manner born,” as it were. This sister was the real “boss” of the party, though, of course, the old gent imagined himself to be; but he was a mere puppet in the hands of his wife, who was ditto it: the hands of the strong-minded sister. The old gentleman’s name was Furness, the sister’s Miss Nora Pole. I remember laughing at the signature at the end of the letter which she wrote announcing their arrival, “Yours truly, N. Pole.” I told Bet she ought to have put “yours frigidly”; it would have been more appropriate for the “North Pole”—and ever after, between ourselves, we called her by that name.

Next to arrive were two maiden ladies, the Misses Stitchins, with their pet dog Fido, whom they would have liked to bring to the table with them at every meal, but this being objected to by the other guests, one sister always remained with the darling creature till the other one had finished her meal, as he really could not be left alone; “he would break his heart.”

Bet did the cooking and took charge of the kitchen. She was a fine cook, I can tell you ; as in everything else she was on the top of the tree. I did the upstairs work and waited on table. The guests breakfasted between eight and nine in the morning, and for about an hour I was kept on the run, as they came down one after another. Mr. Furness gave more trouble at the table than any of the others. He had a peculiarity which was very irritating to me—he wanted everything he saw. We had not advanced so far as to have bills of fare at present, so I used to repeat the menu in an undertone to each guest as I took their order- —beefsteak, cold ham, fried ham, eggs, fish, or whatever we might have. The old gent sat at the head of the table, and was always first at his post. At the sound of the bell he made a bee-line in doublequick time to his place. After he had made his choice and been served I would go to some of the others, but no sooner did he hear the next order given than he would call out, “I will take some of that, too,” and so on, all round.

Perhaps one of the Misses Stitchins would say, “I will take a hard-boiled egg”; the other sister, “I will try a poached egg on toast.” A loud voice from the end of the table would call out, “I will take a hard-boiled egg and a poached egg on toast.”

Or perhaps one of the boarders would say, “Have you any marmalade? I don’t think I will take any meat this morning.” Like an echo came from Mr. Furness the request for the same. Finally, he would be literally surrounded with small dishes and plates. I confess my patience would give out towards the last, and some of the plates would be put down in front of him with rather a sounding whack! Nothing seemed to disturb him, though, and he helped himself to the choice tid-bits off every dish, his wife and the “North Pole,” who flanked him on either side, evidently tickled to think he was getting the full value of his board money. The Misses Stitchins, though, regarded him with eyes of horror and disgust. The young men joked sotto voce amongst themselves; it was great fun for them.

I remember once (ust such another gourmand as Mr. Furness. It was on board ship. They say “a person’s true nature is shown when travelling.” He sat opposite to me at table and acted in much the same way as our boarder. He seemed to be on the constant watch to see that no one got ahead of him.

One day I was late: at lunch and the baked apples were all gone. My steward on discovering this brought me a nice orange on a plate, saying as he set it in front of me, “The apples are all gone, so I asked the head steward for an orange.” I thanked him; but looking across the table saw the eyes of the gentleman opposite fixed with a hungry glare on my poor orange. “Waiter,” he called to his own steward, “bring me an orange.” The steward started, and glancing across at us, met, I suppose, the eye of his fellow-waiter behind my chair, for I distinctly saw the wink. He went out into the passage (I’m sure he went no farther), and returned in about a minute, saying, “The fruit is all locked up, sir, and the head steward can’t be found with the keys, but there’ll be oranges on the table at dinner, sir.” So “His Greediness” got fooled; and as everybody’s attention seemed to be drawn to my orange I picked it up and retired to the privacy of my own cabin to eat it. Don’t you think this gentleman and Mr. Furness must have been kindred spirits? What would have happened, think you, if they had been caged up together with a limited supply of food? It is hard to say. I think it would have been a case of “the survival of the fittest.”

But to return to our boarders. Mr Furness hired a boat, and they spent a great part of the time on the water. The Misses Stitchins spent most of their time on the verandah busily engaged with squares of coarse linen, needles and bunches of washing silks, with which they were patiently producing hideous monstrosities in the way of flowers, birds and butterflies, holding them up for each other's admiration when there was, unfortunately", no one else near enough to admire. Notwithstanding, they were dear old souls, and gave us less trouble than any of the rest They took their dip in the lake every" morning regularly at eleven, wearing oil-skin caps to avoid wetting their hair; wet towels inside the caps to avoid sunstroke; long sleeved bathing dresses to avoid sunburn; canvas bathing shoes to avoid mud-turtles; and very pretty they looked, I assure you, as they disported themselves with modest mien ir. the cooling waters of the lake. Dear me! what a shock it would be to them if they saw the young folks bathing now-a-days—girls with bare arms and legs taking headers from the wharf, turning a somersault in the air before they touched the water; young men in still scantier attire gazing admiringly at them, and then all splashing and dashing together in the water like a shoal of porpoises. I verily believe that if the Misses Stitchins could have seen such a sight, the oil-skin caps, wet towels included, would have risen from their heads in horror; they would hardly have survived such a scene.

The next boarder to arrive at Hathaway’s Bay was a tail ascetic-looking High Church clergyman, with shaven face, high collar, very straight vest and clerical coat. He entered his name as the key. Theophilus Monk, M.A., D.D.—mad with a double D, as Winnie said, looking over my shoulder at the entry. He spoke with the “lovely drawl” so much admired by the “ritualistic school of oratory.” You know what it sounds like. “He that hath yaws to yaw let him yaw”—that kind of style, which to me is so unnatural. We overheard him telling father, while sitting on the verandah on the evening of his arrival, he was suffering from insomnia and dyspepsia brought on by overstudy and too rigid lenten abstinence, and though very sorry to leave his flock, whom he was guiding gently back to the “faith of their fathers,” he had been informed by his medical advisers that he must really go into retreat for a few months and endeavor to “recuperate his physique.” This last phrase tickled our fancy very much, has in fact remained with us as a family saying to this day, and no one of us can ever look pale, sick or weary, without being immediately told by another member of the family to “Go and recuperate your physique.” Miss Pole had been doing a little deft angling on her own account with our four nice young boarders, but so far without securing a single bite, and to-morrow they were leaving us; but her face brightened when she saw the Rev. Monk. Here was another fish she could possibly hook. She commenced her angling next morning at breakfast—it happened to be Friday. “What! no fish?” she began, “and this Friday,” glancing round and speaking loud enough to let the reverend gentleman hear. “I suppose then I am reduced to eggs for breakfast. But I do hope. Miss Hathaway, that there will be fish for dinner, or I don’t know what I shall do. You know "I never eat meat on Fridays.” I knew nothing of the sort, but I discreetly held my peace and went for the eggs. Before two days were over, however, I saw “my lady" being paddled around the bay in Mr. Monk’s canoe, which he had hired to assist in the “recuperation.” Ah! I thought to myself, you are doing well, Miss Pole, provided you don’t strike the rock of “clerical celibacy”; that would be a disastrous crulling to your “fishing excursion.”

This morning our pleasant quartette of young men bade us “good-bye,” much to our regret. They left us with many good wishes for our success and promises to visit us again. We felt quite low spirited as we saw them depart waving their handkerchiefs to us till the boat carried them out of our sight.

My time, too, had nearly come to an end—as all things do in this world—and though I was loath to depart, “necessity knew no choice.” Bet had secured the services of a nice young girl, a settler’s daughter, to take my place for the few remaining weeks of the season. I will only be able to tell you, therefore, of one more arrival and then close this chapter.

Two days before my departure the weather turned very wet and stormy—there was a regular “Muskoka soaker,” for when it does rain here it comes down with a will; it is a case of “water, water, everywhere;” the verandahs are streaming, the summer kitchen leaking, the guests grumbling, the children tumbling (excuse the rhyme, it was not intentional). Altogether such days as this of continued downpour in the summer season are one of the hardest things the boarding-house-keeper has to contend with. All the guests look like fish out of water, as they literally are for the nonce—that is if they have sense enough to keep indoors; but they don’t appear to know what to do with themselves. They hang around, yawning and looking first at the sky and then at the weather glass, and are generally miserable. Thank goodness, such days are the exception in Muskoka.

Well, that evening it was coming down like cats and dogs when the boat came in. No one went down to the wharf except father, but Bet, who was watching from the staircase window, called out to me, “Nan, here’s a whole family coming, all dripping wet, babies and children, too.” So it proved. In they trooped, escorted by father, with all their belongings, the water dripping from their clothes in little streams, and the most comical part was that they had brought a tent with them, intending to put it up and sleep under it that night. Evidently they had not bargained with the weather prophet, and father informed them, unless they were anxious to be drowned, they had better stick to the house till the weather broke. Their name was Merryweather and they had come all the way from Chicago.

As we got talking we discovered that he was an American, a lawyer, and she an English girl, a governess who had come out to Chicago with an English family and met her fate there in the shape of plump little Mr. Merryweather. They had been married five years and there were now three little Merryweathers. She told us they had lived these five years in a Chicago flat and had never until now been away from the city for a holiday. Her children had never even seen the country, and, therefore, they wanted to get as far away from civilization as possible and just live out of doors. “I mean to take off the children’s shoes and stockings,” she said, “and let them run about barefoot, and paddle in the water, if it is safe,” looking anxiously at us. We assured her on that point, and the faces of the two eldest children, who were eagerly listening as they clung to their mother’s skirt, instantly assumed a look of rapture as they thought of the bliss awaiting them on the morrow. The eldest little fellow even wanted to go to bed without his supper, thinking the morning would come sooner. When the morning did dawn it was sunny and bright, and in Muskoka, no matter how much rain may fall, when it ceases everything dries up like magic and all is bright again.

This was my last day here, and when all nature was looking so beautiful and fresh the thought of leaving seemed worse than ever. I believe I had a very woe-begone face as I went about my work, and Bet bore me company in my depression.

The little Merryweathers were racing round soon after daybreak. I don’t think their father and mother got much rest after about four o’ciock. Everything was a novelty to the children, and they were like little crazy things. When Ben went out to milk the cows, the eldest boy followed, He stood in the doorway and watched the first cow milked, with a most astonished face, and then returned to the house to interview his mother. “Is that where the milk comes from? Well, don’t put any on my porridge never, never, no more.”

There was worse to follow, though, for the little man, after breakfast, was pursuing his investigations around the back premises when he came upon the old sow, stretched in the sun, with her youthful progeny actively imbibing their morning meal. He stood gazing at them horrified for a moment, then turned and fled to the house, bursting in upon his mother with the tears streaming down his face,—“Oh mommer! mummer!” clutching her frantically by the skirts, “its awful dreadful! Mr. Hathaway’s little pigs are starving, just starving," then, in a horror-stricken tone, almost a whisper, “Why, they’re actually eating their mother!!!”

Poor child! So much for being brought up in a Chicago flat.

Bet told me in her letters, after I got home, that the Merryweathers gave up the idea of living in the tent and stayed on with them for more than a month. They were altogether so charmed with Muskoka that they made up their minds, as soon as they could afford it, to put up a summer cottage for themselves, and come every year.

I might as well tell you, also, that the “North Pole” did succeed in landing the Monk, and that two or three years later they paid another visit to Hathaway’s Bay, plus a nursemaid and a sturdy young Monk.