In the afternoon they continued their sight-seeing by visiting the Athenaeum on Federal street.  They found it to be a large white building with pillars in front, on the lower floor of which Miss Ray was particularly pleased to see such a good library of six thousand volumes, and a reading-room with the leading English and American periodicals, the use of which she learned was to be gained by the payment of a small sum.  Bessie was attracted to the oil-painting on the wall of Abraham Quary, who was the last of the Indian race on the island.  Then they examined, in an adjoining room, the curiosities gathered together for public inspection.  Here they found the model of the “Camels,” and also the jaw of a sperm whale, seventeen feet long, with forty-six teeth and a weight of eight hundred pounds.  Bessie said that the whale from which it was taken was eighty-seven feet long and weighed two hundred tons.  When Mrs. Gordon learned that this very whale was taken in the Pacific Ocean and brought to the Island by a Nantucket Captain, she became as much interested in it as in the “Camels,” for surely it had an historical interest.  After an hour spent in this entertaining manner, they returned to their boarding-place in time to greet the gentlemen who had come back with glowing accounts of their day’s work, or rather pleasure, for they had met with splendid success.  Tom’s fingers were blistered, but what was that compared to the fun of blue-fishing!

What particularly interested the ladies was a “Portuguese man of war” which one of the gentlemen had caught in a pail and brought home alive.  This beautiful specimen of a fish, seen only at Nantucket, their hostess said, and seldom caught alive, was admired by all, who, indeed, were mostly ignorant of the habits or even the existence of such a creature.  Bessie wondered how such a lovely iridescent thing could be poison to the touch.  Tom promised to study up about it when he should begin his winter studies, whereupon his mother said that if he would tell her what he should learn about it she would write it out for the benefit of them all.

The next morning they all started from the wharf at nine o’clock in the miniature steamer, “Island Belle,” for Wauwinet, a place seven miles from the town.  Miss Ray had become interested in the pretty Indian names which she had heard, and was struck with this, which she learned was the name of an old Indian chief who once controlled a large eastern part of the island.  In an hour they landed on the beach at Wauwinet.  They found it decorated with its rows of scallop-shells, some of which they gathered as they walked along.  Some of the party made use of this still-water bathing, while others ran across the island, some three hundred yards, to enjoy the surf-bathing there.  Tom was delighted with this novelty of two beaches, separated by such a narrow strip of land, that he was continually going back and forth to try the water in both places.  He