"A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast—"
Phil Merryweather was singing as he brought his boat about. "Slacken your sheet, Peggy! easy—that's right! a half-hitch—look here, young lady! I believe you have been humbugging us all; don't tell me you never sailed a boat before!"
"Never in all my life!" said Peggy, looking up joyously. "I have only dreamed of it and thought about it, ever since I can remember. And I have read the 'Seaman's Friend,' and 'Two Years Before the Mast,' so I do know a little bit about how things ought to go. I think every girl ought to learn how to sail a boat, if she possibly can; but out on the ranch, you see, there really wasn't any chance. We could only make believe, but we used to have great fun doing that."
"How did you make your believe? I should like to hear about it. Ease her off a bit—so—as you are!"
"Why, we made a boat out of the great swing in the barn. It is a huge barn, and the swing is big enough for three elephants to swing on at once; and Hugh fastened hammocks along it lengthwise, and then rigged ropes and pulleys for us, and an old canvas hammock with the ends cut off for a sail; so we swung, and called it sailing, and had storms and shipwrecks, and all kinds of adventures. It was great fun. Oh, I do wish some of you could come out to the ranch some day. If there was only water, it would be the best place in the world—except this and Fernley."
"I'm coming some day!" said Phil. "See if I don't. It must be corking sport, riding about over those great plains."
"Oh! it is!" cried Peggy. "When you come, Phil, you shall ride Monte. He is the most beautiful creature, a Spanish jennet. Jack Del Monte sent him to brother Jim, but he isn't up to Jim's weight, so he lets me ride him. He is like the horses in poetry, that is the only way I can describe him; white as milk, with great dark eyes, and graceful—oh, I do want you to see him. No horse in poetry was ever half so beautiful; in fact, I think I take back what I said; I don't really think poets know much about horses; do you?"
"'Zebra-footed, ostrich-thighed,'" quoted Phil, laughing.
"I know!" said Peggy, indignantly. "Now, the idea, Phil! one thinks of a poor dear horse all over ostrich feathers behind, which is dreadful. But then, I don't understand poetry, except about battles, Macaulay and Scott. Don't you love 'Marmion'?"
"Indeed I do!" said Phil, heartily. "Hi!"