We all sprang to out feet, and clapped our hands with the wildest enthusiasm.
"I'm not afraid to dare the wildest storms on the ocean with that craft," says I.
"Nor I."
"Nor I."
Sisters, it was a spontaneous outburst of pure state patriotism—even that child Cecilia seemed to feel it—for ten minutes after she was busy as a bee, sewing a silver anchor on her Leghorn flat, and that day, for the first time, I kissed the child with spontaneosity.
LXXI.
YACHT-RACING.
SISTERS:—When you go to a yacht-race, the first step is peculiar. You get into a carriage or a car, and ride down to the docks. Then you steam off in a ferry-boat to Staten Island, get into a thing they call a yawl, which floats like a cockle-shell, and carries two or three people, and row off to one of the cunningest, prettiest, slenderest, most scrumptious little ships you ever set eyes on, sitting on the water like a white duck with its wings spread.
Some black-walnut steps fell down the side, over which I climbed, with my heart in my mouth, and jumped into a little pew, with a sofa running round it, and some light cross-legged chairs ready for visitors.