Mr. Evringham smiled, looking at his daughter.

“Yes,” said Julia.  “Jewel has gone into Lake Michigan once or twice, and I think she was very much surprised to find that the Atlantic did not taste the same.”

“Sit down here,” said Mr. Evringham, “and I’ll show you what your father used to like to do twenty-five years ago.”

Jewel sat down, with much interest, and watched the speaker scoop out a shallow place in the sand and make a ring about it.

“There, do you see these little hoppers?”

Julia was looking on, also.  “Aren’t they cunning, Jewel?” she exclaimed.  “Exactly like tiny lobsters.”

“Only they’re white instead of red,” replied the child, and her grandfather smiled and caught one of the semi-transparent creatures.

“Lobsters are green when they’re at home,” he said.  “It’s only in our homes that they turn red.”

“Really?”

“Yes.  There are a number of things you have to learn, Jewel.  The ocean is a splendid playmate, but rough.  That is one of the things for you to remember.”

“But I can wade, can’t I?  I want to build so many things that the water runs up into.”

“Certainly, you can take off your shoes and stockings when it’s warm enough, as it is this morning, if your mother is willing you should drabble your skirts; but keep your dress on and then you won’t forget yourself.”

Jewel leaned toward the speaker affectionately.  “Grandpa, you know I’m a pretty big girl.  I’ll be nine the first of September.”

“Yes, I know that.”

“Beside, you’re going to be with me all the time,” she went on.

“H’m.  Well, now see these sand-fleas race.”

“Oh, are they sand-fleas?  Just wait for Anna Belle.”  The child reached over to where the doll was gazing, fascinated, at the advancing, roaring breakers.

Her boa and plumed hat had evidently been put away from the moths.  She wore a most becoming bathing costume of blue and white, and a coquettish silk handkerchief was knotted around her head.  It was evident that, in common with some other summer girls, she did not intend to wet her fetching bathing-suit, and certainly it would be a risk to go into the water wearing the necklace that now sparkled in the summer sun.

“Come here, dearie, and see the baby lobsters,” said Jewel, holding her child carefully away from her own glistening wetness, and seating her against Mrs. Evringham’s knee.

“If lobsters could hop like this,” said Mr. Evringham, “they would be shooting out of the ocean like dolphins.  Now you choose one, Jewel, and we’ll see which wins the race.  We’re going to place them in the middle of the ring, and watch which hops first outside the circle.”

Jewel chuckled gleefully as she caught one.  “Oh, mother, aren’t his eyes funny!  He looks as surprised all the time.  Now hop, dearie,” she added, as she placed him beside the one Mr. Evringham had set down.  “Which do you guess, Anna Belle?  She guesses grandpa’s will beat.”