"Come to supper now," said Mrs. Leverett.

Doris kept hold of Uncle Win's hand until she reached her place. He went around to the other side of the table. She decided she liked him very much. She liked almost everybody: the captain had been so friendly, and Mrs. Jewett and some of the ladies on board the vessel so kind. But Betty and Uncle Win went to the very first place with her.

The elders had all the conversation, and it seemed about some coming trouble to the country that she did not understand. She knew there had been war in France and various other European countries. Little girls were not very well up in geography in those days, but they did learn a good deal listening to their elders.

They were hardly through supper when Captain Grier came with the very japanned box papa had brought over from France and placed in Miss Arabella's care. His name was on it--"Charles Winthrop Adams." Oh, and that was Uncle Win's name, too! Surely, they _were_ relations! Doris experienced a sense of gladness.

Betty brought out a table standing against the wainscot. You touched a spring underneath, and the circular side came up and made a flat top.

The captain took a small key out of a curious long leathern purse, and Uncle Win unlocked the box and spread out the papers. There was the marriage certificate of Jacqueline Marie de la Maur and Charles Winthrop Adams, and the birth and baptismal record of Doris Jacqueline de la Maur Adams, and ever so many other records and letters.

Mr. Winthrop Adams gave the captain a receipt for them, and thanked him cordially for all his care and attention to his little niece.

"She was a pretty fair sailor after the first week," said the captain with a twinkle in his eye. He was very much wrinkled and weather-beaten, but jolly and good-humored. "And now, sissy, I'm glad you're safe with your folks, and I hope you'll grow up into a nice clever woman. 'Taint no use wishin' you good looks, for you're purty as a pink now--one of them rather palish kind. But you'll soon have red cheeks."

Doris had very red cheeks for a moment. Betty leaned over to her brother, and whispered:

"What a splendid opportunity lost! Aunt Priscilla ought to be here to say, 'Handsome is as handsome does.'"

Then Captain Grier shook hands all round and took his departure.

Afterward the two men discussed business about the little girl. There must be another trustee, and papers must be taken out for guardianship.

They would go to the court-house, say at eleven to-morrow, and put everything in train.

Betty took out some knitting. It was a stocking of fine linen thread, and along the instep it had a pretty openwork pattern that was like lace work.

"That is to wear with slippers," she explained to Doris. "But it's a sight of work. 'Lecty had six pairs when she was married. That's my second sister, Mrs. King. She lives in Hartford. I want to go and make her a visit this winter."

Mrs. Leverett's stocking was of the more useful kind, blue-gray yarn, thick and warm, for her husband's winter wear. She did not have to count stitches and make throws, and take up two here and three there.

"Warren," said his mother, when he had poked the fire until she was on 'pins and needles,'--they didn't call it nervous then,--"Warren, I am 'most out of corn. I wish you'd go shell some."

"The hens do eat an awful lot, seems to me. Why, I shelled only a few nights ago."

"I touched bottom when I gave them the last feed this afternoon. By spring we won't have so many," nodding in a half-humorous fashion.

"Don't you want to come out and see me? You don't have any Indian corn growing in England, I've heard."

"Did it belong to the Indians?" asked Doris.

"I rather guess it did, in the first instance. But now we plant it for ourselves. _We_ don't, because father sold the two-acre lot, and they're bringing a street through. So now we have only the meadow."

Doris looked at the uncles, but she couldn't understand a word they were saying.

"Come!" Warren held out his hand.

"Put the big kitchen apron round her, Warren," said Betty, thinking of her silk gown.

He tied the apron round her neck and brought back the strings round her waist, so she was all covered. Then he found her a low chair, and poked the kitchen fire, putting on a pine log to make a nice blaze. He brought out from the shed a tub and a basket of ears of corn. Across the tub he laid the blade of an old saw and then sat on the end to keep it firm.

"Now you'll see business. Maybe you've never seen any corn before?"

She looked over in the basket, and then took up an ear with a mysterious expression.

"It won't bite you," he said laughingly.

"But how queer and hard, with all these little points," pinching them with her dainty fingers.

"Grains," he explained. "And a husk grows on the outside to keep it warm. When the winter is going to be very cold the husk is very thick."

"Will this winter be cold?"

"Land alive! yes. Winters always _are_ cold."

Warren settled himself and drew the ear across the blade. A shower of corn rattled down on the bottom of the tub.

"Oh! is that the way you peel it off?"

He threw his head back and laughed.

"Oh, you Englisher! We _shell_ it off."

"Well, it peels too. You peel a potato and an apple with a knife blade.

Oh, what a pretty white core!"

"Cob. We Americans are adding new words to the language. A core has seeds in it. There, see how soft it is."

Doris took it in her hand and then laid her cheek against it. "Oh, how soft and fuzzy it is!" she cried. "And what do you do with it?"

"We don't plant that part of it. That core has no seeds. You have to plant a grain like this. The little clear point we call a heart, and that sprouts and grows. This is a good use for the cob."

He had finished another, which he tossed into the fire. A bright blaze seemed to run over it all at once and die down. Then the small end flamed out and the fire crept along in a doubtful manner until it was all covered again.

"They're splendid to kindle the fire with. And pine cones. America has lots of useful things."

"But they burn cones in France. I like the spicy smell. It's queer though," wrinkling her forehead. "Did the Indians know about corn the first?"

"That is the general impression unless America was settled before the Indians. Uncle Win has his head full of these things and is writing a book. And there is tobacco that Sir Walter Raleigh carried home from Virginia."

"Oh, I know about Sir Walter and Queen Elizabeth."

"He was a splendid hero. I think people are growing tame now; there are no wars except Indian skirmishes."

"Why, Napoleon is fighting all the time."

"Oh, that doesn't count," declared the young man with a lofty air. "We had some magnificent heroes in the Revolution. There are lots of places for you to see. Bunker Hill and Lexington and Concord and the headquarters of Washington and Lafayette. The French were real good to us, though we have had some scrimmages with them. And now that you are to be a Boston girl----"

"But I was in Old Boston before," and she laughed. "Very old Boston, that is so far back no one can remember, and it was called Ikanhoe, which means Boston. There is the old church and the abbey that St.

Botolph founded. They came over somewhere in six hundred, and were missionaries from France--St. Botolph and his brother."