youth; an inch or two taller, maybe, than his brother, whom we had left
in charge of the boat. It would have puzzled you to guess their ages.
Young they surely were, but much gazing in the face of the salt wind had
creased the corners of their eyes, and their faces wore a beautiful
gravity, as though they had been captured young and dedicated to some
priestly service.

Reuben touched his cap, and, taking the book from Seth without a word,
led us to the cottage, where his mother stood scouring a deal table: a
little woman with dark eyes like beads, and thin grey hair tucked within
a grey muslin cap. She had kilted her gown high and tucked up her
sleeves, and looked to me, for all the world, like a doll on a penwiper.
But her hands were busy continually; the small room shone and gleamed
with her tireless cleansing and polishing; and in the midst of it her
eyes sparkled with expectation of news from the outer world.

Seth understood her, and rattled at once into a recital of all the
happenings on the islands: births, marriages, and deaths, sickness,
courtship, and boat-building, the price of market-stuff, and the names
of vessels newly arrived in the roads. But after a minute she turned
from him to my father.

"'Tis all so narrow, sir--Seth's news. I want to know what's happenin'
in the world."

Now, much was happening in those May weeks--much all over Europe, but
much indeed in France, where Paris was passing through the sharp agonies
of the Commune. The latest my father had to tell was almost a week old;
but two days before we set sail for the islands the Versaillais troops
had swept the boulevards, and every steamer had brought newspapers from