The Captain was sitting in a queer little bowl of a skiff on the deck of his tug, and rocking it like a cradle, as he talked.

“Bosting’s always hard to beat in anything,” rejoined the ex-Chairman.  “But if Bosting is to be beat, here’s the man to do it.”

* * * * *

And now, perhaps, gentle reader, you think I have said enough in behalf of a limited fraternity, the Skaters.

The next chapter, then, shall take up the cause of the Lovers, a more numerous body, and we will see whether True Love, which never makes “smooth running,” can help its progress by a skate-blade.

CHAPTER VI.

“GO NOT, HAPPY DAY, TILL THE MAIDEN YIELDS.”

Christmas noon at Dunderbunk.  Every skater was in galloping glee,—­as the electric air, and the sparkling sun, and the glinting ice had a right to expect that they all should be.

Belle Purtett, skating simply and well, had never looked so pretty and graceful.  So thought Bill Tarbox.

He had not spoken to her, nor she to him, for more than six months.  The poor fellow was ashamed of himself and penitent for his past bad courses.  And so, though he longed to have his old flame recognize him again, and though he was bitterly jealous and miserably afraid he should lose her, he had kept away and consumed his heart like a true despairing lover.

But to-day Bill was a lion, only second to Wade, the unapproachable lion-in-chief.  Bill was reinstated in public esteem, and had won back his standing in the Foundry.  He had to-day made a speech which Perry Purtett gave everybody to understand “none of Senator Bill Seward’s could hold the tallow to.”  Getting up the meeting and presenting Wade with the skates was Bill’s own scheme, and it had turned out an eminent success.  Everything began to look bright to him.  His past life drifted out of his mind like the rowdy tales he used to read in the Sunday newspapers.

He had watched Belle Purtett all the morning, and saw that she distinguished nobody with her smiles, not even that coq du village, Ringdove.  He also observed that she was furtively watching him.

By-and-by she sailed out of the crowd, and went off a little way to practise.

“Now,” said he to himself, “sail in, Bill Tarbox!”

Belle heard the sharp strokes of a powerful skater coming after her.  Her heart divined who this might be.  She sped away like the swift Camilla, and her modest drapery showed just enough and “ne quid nimis” of her ankles.

Bill admired the grace and the ankles immensely.  But his hopes sank a little at the flight,—­for he thought she perceived his chase and meant to drop him.  Bill had not bad a classical education, and knew nothing of Galatea in the Eclogue,—­how she did not hide, until she saw her swain was looking fondly after.

“She wants to get away,” he thought “But she sha’n’t,—­no, not if I have to follow her to Albany.”