"The Crooked Rivers and Capers have had their flag up these three weeks," said Lunette; "and I heard how the Artichokes had h'isted theirn yesterday. When the Artichokes have got their flag up, seems as though the Basins had better be thinkin' o' what time it is in the mornin'!"

"What is the flag to be raised for?" I inquired, with unsuspecting innocence.

There was an afflicted silence; still they loved me. Lunette alone answered at last, turning to Tyson, not to me.

"I should think it 's enough to have a flag-raisin' without a-askin'

what it is for!" said she. "What does trees grow for? What does anything in natur' act the way it does for?"

I, ever safe anch.o.r.ed behind Lunette's championship, looked out securely at the derelict Tyson, to see if he could answer. He could not, but was abashed. Still I so far appropriated the hint, wisely and delicately delivered, that I made no further inquiries, only giving myself unhesitatingly to the joy of preparation.

The flag was to be raised over the school-house, and instead of wending our way dissonantly thither, as was our habit in attending the meetings, we were to go in procession!

A curious awe attached to this idea, in which I fully shared, as, being formed in line, I tried to limp martially behind the valiant Lunette.

"Halt, by clam!" said our general.

"What is it?" came in whispers along the line.

"Jakie Teel" (one of the sculpins) "'s got his trousers on hind side afore!"

"Flory dressed him by candlelight this mornin', so 't she could get time to make three loaves o' angel-cake for the flag-raisin'."

The victim of this mysterious adventure was led away by his mother for reaccoutrement, while we as a regiment waited patiently for his return to warlike rank and file.

"If these condummit ructions are over," said our general--for the wind was blowing cold--"forwards ag'in, by clam!" and we marched upon the schoolhouse; but we encountered so many difficulties, of wayward ropes, in hoisting our ensign, that Captain Pharo declared, rubbing his chilled hands:

"'T we'd omit the usual cheerin' 'tell we'd been in and thawed out--ef they was any thaw to us--leastways baited."

Vesty was there with the rest, munching a slice of angel-cake--fit food for her! I smiled kindly upon her, but did not forget that I was an indifferent bean-pole.

"Major!" cried the Basin, toward the close of the repast, with its mouth sweet and full--"Major, a speech! a speech!"

Now I had a heart given to the Basin, with a simple thought or two, and I requisitioned the best of my forces for the "Occasion," conscious of my morning glory there--oh, she of the skies! munching angel's food.

Whatever I had said or done, moreover, the Basin would have applauded; yet such cheers as I heard now left no doubt upon my too-willing and plastic sense of a phenomenal and hitherto unsuspected ability.

"Vesty," said Elder Skates, starting to his feet, "will you start--start--start--anything?"

"We always _do_ sing

"'In the prison cells I set, Thinking, mother dear, of you,'

to flag-raisin'," said the ever well-informed and officious Lunette.

"Somehow," said Captain Pharo, shrugging his shoulders, "thar 's too much of a sea-rake blowin' acrost the back o' my neck t' sing 'Prison Cells;' 'tain't clost enough for it here. What d'ye say to 'Hold the Fort'?"

What they said was unanimous. Even Captain Leezur knew it, and the sculpins, of terrible voice. It was sung with such complete personal abandonment to strong oral gifts that, at the second verse, the remaining quota of plastering upon the school-house roof became loosened and fell with a crash upon the head of that very unfortunate sculpin who under other blighting circ.u.mstances had been forced to undergo temporary absence from our ranks in the morning.

He uttered a mature sea-oath, and was again marched violently from our presence by his mother; but I was happy to see that he returned soon afterward and renewed his portion of the song with a gusto which the added quality of defiance now rendered deafening, while through all our din sounded true the flute of Vesty's sweet voice.

"We mustn't forgit the occasion, I s'pose," said Captain Pharo, our general, at length. "Poo! poo! hohum! I s'pose it's about time we was thinkin' o' goin' out to cheer the flag. Forwards, by clam! Poo! poo!

hohum! Wal, wal--

[Ill.u.s.tration: Music fragment: "'My days are as the gra.s.s--'"]

"Sh!" said Mrs. Kobbe, deftly getting audience at his ear.

"Ladies an' gentlemen an' childern," said Captain Pharo, taking his place beside the flag; "we've h'isted of 'er, an' here she blows"--he put his hand in his pocket for his pipe, and drew from his vest a match.

Mrs. Kobbe coughed loudly, and even shook her head at him: he put them back.

"We have h'isted on 'er," he continued, "an' here she blows!"

Mrs. Kobbe's cough of deeper warning and high-mounting blushes on his account nerved him.

"We've h'isted of 'er," he shouted with desperate defiance, "and thar she blows, don't she, by clam! on the full, the free, the glorious, an'

the ever-lastin' h'ist!"

A st.u.r.dy round of applause was not wanting, but on this point Mrs.

Kobbe was visibly sceptical: she received her lord with sniffs of disdain.

"'The full, the free, the glorious, an' the ever-lastin' h'ist'!" said she. "Where was you eddicated, Cap'n Pharo Kobbe?"

"It don't make but darn little difference whar ye've been eddicated,"

replied Captain Pharo, "when ye're tryin' to make a speech, an' one o'

them devil-fish boys goes around behind ye an' snaps a live lobster onto the slack o' yer britches!"

Giggles from a school of sculpins safe hidden somewhere lent further aggravation to the dilemma.

"Jakie Teel an' Pharie Kobbe, Junior, 'll come to judgment," cried Mrs.

Kobbe, in a loud voice, "'specially Pharie Kobbe as soon 's ever he gits home," whereat giggling from that miscreant quarter ceased, and she relieved her lord of his painful embarra.s.sment.

But at this point a new and surprising development arose. The Basin horses attached to some wholesale herring-boxes, extemporized as sleighs, were driven to the scene. Captain Pharo, with heart-whole joy at the sight, lit his pipe and declared, with now beaming countenance:

"It has been arranged, to crown this happy 'casion, for all our unmarried Basins over sixteen year o' age, not forgettin' widders under forty, to have a sleigh ride. Elder Skates'll reel off the names, accordin' to which you can pile yerselves in accordin'ly, two 'n' two, side by side, thus 'n' so, male an' female, created He them!"

Flushed with inspiration, Captain Pharo glanced triumphantly at his wife, who, at this more than Pentateuchal ill.u.s.tration, refused to sneer.

So absorbed was I in watching the gleeful embarkation, and so little dreamed I of being considered in a case like this, it had not even occurred to me that I too was an unmarried Basin widely over sixteen years of age, and yet a little under forty, when--

To the choicest seat in the very largest herring-box, the back of which was stylishly bedizened by the splendors of the star bedquilt, I heard my own name called:

"Major Paul Henry and the Widder Rafe!"

Who and where was the Widow Rafe? Lo! Vesty stepped out. To be sure--the formal, the flag-raising, the "Occasion" name of Vesty!

I led her to her place, but, as for me, I sat down, lost to mortal woes, silent and dazed, among the stars.