My father said presently, however, "You must carry him off to sea, George; and I shall call you to account if those pale cheeks don't gather roses from the crests of the waves."
Then we drew up the anchor of the little yacht, and pushed off from the shore. A basket of provisions had been placed in the boat, and before we had been very long out at sea, George insisted upon its being unpacked, threatening Aleck that he should be reported as insubordinate unless he consumed precisely the quantity of wine and the whole amount of cold chicken dealt out to him.
"Willie," whispered my cousin to me, after dutifully doing his best at the luncheon, "I want very much indeed to go to the White-Rock Cove—do you think George will let us?"
Certainly I did not think so, but Aleck wished it, and that was quite enough to make me join earnestly in his entreaties that we should turn the boat's head round in the direction he wished.
Groves consented at last, but not without many misgivings, the White-Rock Cove being, he said, about the last place he'd have thought of taking us to; and sentiments to the same effect were respectfully echoed by Ralph, who, in my private belief, had held the place in superstitious horror ever since the 20th of September.
All of us, however, yielded as a matter of course when it was found Aleck had set his mind upon it; and the wind being favourable, we were not very long in rounding Braycombe headland.
Once in the Cove, my cousin asked me to land with him, requesting George and Ralph to leave us ashore a little while.
"It must have been almost exactly here, I think," said Aleck, leading the way to the spot which I remembered only too vividly, and glancing round to assure himself that our companions were out of sight. "Willie, I want us to thank God here, on the very spot—there's no one to see us—let us kneel down."
We knelt together at the foot of the White Rock; Aleck, who was still very weak, leaning against me for support. They were only a few childish words he said, but they came from a full heart; and I never remember in later life any liturgical service in church or cathedral that stirred my feelings more deeply than that simple thanksgiving. Nor even now, after the lapse of many a long year, can I visit that little retired nook in the dear Braycombe coast, and hear the plash of the ripple, and the flap of the sea-gulls' wings, and the echoing murmurs of the sea in the caverns, without being carried back by a rush of tender recollection to that day when all Nature's sweet voices seemed to be uniting in one hymn of praise, taking up and beautifying and repeating the utterance of two little thankful hearts—
"We praise Thee, O God."