“Naow, I call that sensible,” said the Eastport man.  “I’ve bin over that graound with his writin’, jest as he read it, in my two hands, and I can testily that he’s got it all in.”

“If Dan here couldn’t do better’n that with one hand before breakfast, he ought to be switched,” said Salters, upholding the honor of Massachusetts on general principles.  “Not but what I’m free to own he’s considerable litt’ery—­fer Maine.  Still—­”

“Guess Uncle Salters’s goin’ to die this trip.  Fust compliment he’s ever paid me,” Dan sniggered.  “What’s wrong with you, Harve?  You act all quiet and you look greenish.  Feelin’ sick?”

“Don’t know what’s the matter with me,” Harvey implied.  “Seems if my insides were too big for my outsides.  I’m all crowded up and shivery.”

“Dispepsy?  Pshaw—­too bad.  We’ll wait for the readin’, an’ then we’ll quit, an’ catch the tide.”

The widows—­they were nearly all of that season’s making—­braced themselves rigidly like people going to be shot in cold blood, for they knew what was coming.  The summer-boarder girls in pink and blue shirt-waists stopped tittering over Captain Edwardes’s wonderful poem, and looked back to see why all was silent.  The fishermen pressed forward as that town official who had talked to Cheyne bobbed up on the platform and began to read the year’s list of losses, dividing them into months.  Last September’s casualties were mostly single men and strangers, but his voice rang very loud in the stillness of the hall.

“September 9th.  Schooner Florrie Anderson lost, with all aboard, off the Georges.

“Reuben Pitman, master, 50, single, Main Street, City.

“Emil Olsen, 19, single, 329 Hammond Street, City.  Denmark.

“Oscar Standberg, single, 25.  Sweden.

“Carl Stanberg, single, 28, Main Street.  City.

“Pedro, supposed Madeira, single, Keene’s boardinghouse.  City.

“Joseph Welsh, alias Joseph Wright, 30, St. John’s,
Newfoundland.”

“No—­Augusty, Maine,” a voice cried from the body of the hall.

“He shipped from St. John’s,” said the reader, looking to see.

“I know it.  He belongs in Augusty.  My nevvy.”

The reader made a pencilled correction on the margin of the list, and resumed.

“Same schooner, Charlie Ritchie, Liverpool, Nova Scotia, 33, single.

“Albert May, 267 Rogers Street, City, 27, single.

“September 27th. —­Orvin Dollard, 30, married, drowned in dory off Eastern Point.”

That shot went home, for one of the widows flinched where she sat, clasping and unclasping her hands.  Mrs. Cheyne, who had been listening with wide-opened eyes, threw up her head and choked.  Dan’s mother, a few seats to the right, saw and heard and quickly moved to her side.  The reading went on.  By the time they reached the January and February wrecks the shots were falling thick and fast, and the widows drew breath between their teeth.