"Beef!" exclaimed the captain involuntarily, but in a tone of such amazed delight that Barbara's eyes dwelt upon him in pity and wonder.
"Myles! Thou dost not mean that thou hast been actually a-hungered!" said she. "Oh Alice, they are starving."
"Starving!" echoed Alice in the same tone of dismay. "Oh Will!"
"Nay, nay, nay!" protested the governor with a somewhat hollow laugh. "We have not feasted of late, perhaps, and the word beef hath a strange sound in our ears, since no meat save a little wild game hath been seen among us for a year or more, but still, thank God, we are well and hearty"—
"Well and hearty!" repeated Alice Southworth. "Look at him, Barbara; look at his cheeks, his temples, look at that hand, all as one with the skeleton in the museum of Leyden. Oh Barbara, to think that we should find them starving after all!"
"Better starving than starved," replied Barbara calmly. "And if the governor will give me warrant, and this same Mistress Eaton will lend me her aid, I will soon set forth a table that shall make hungry men's hearts leap within them."
"There, Will," exclaimed Alice generously. "That is the sort of maid she is, never stopping to lament and wring her hands as silly I do, but ever looking for the way to mend the evil, and finding it, too."
Dame Eaton, whom we have known as Lois, maid to Mistress Carver, but now married to Francis Eaton and promoted on her marriage to be the governor's housekeeper, soon made her appearance, and the three women were not long in setting forth a breakfast whereunto the governor invited as many of his neighbors as the table could accommodate, and over which he offered a thanksgiving, glowing with loving gratitude to Him who giveth all.