"Yes, sir."
"Well, success to you! Poor Claudia! I hope she will be vindicated. I will talk farther of this with you to-morrow, after church. Now I see that you are very weary and need repose. Good-night! God bless you, my dear boy."
Very early the next morning Ishmael arose, and after making his toilet and offering up his devotions, he went out to refresh himself by a stroll on the beach that fine winter morning.
Very exhilarating it was to him, coming from the crowded city, to saunter up and down the sands, letting his eyes wander over the broad, sun-lit waters and the winding, wooded shores.
He watched the latest, hardier fish, not yet driven to warmer climes, leap up through the sparkling ripples and disappear again.
He watched the waterfowl start up in flocks from some near brake, and, spreading their broad wings, sail far away over the bright emerald-green waves.
Along the shore he noted the sly, brown squirrel peep at him from her hole, and then hop quickly out of sight; and the hardy little snow-bird light at his feet and then dart swiftly away.
Very dear to Ishmael were all these little darlings of nature. They had been the playfellows of his boyhood; and something of the boy survived in Ishmael yet, as it does in every pure young man. It is only sin that destroys youthfulness.
Sometimes he watched a distant sail disappear below the horizon, and followed her in imagination over the seas, and thought with youthful delight how soon he too would be on the deep blue waves of mid- ocean.
A step and a voice roused him from his reverie.