His father was alone there, looking over the morning paper.
"Good-morning, Papa," Max said. "I am ready to recite whenever you want to hear me."
"Ah! are you, indeed?" the Captain said, taking the book; "then I shall hear this lesson at once."
Max recited very creditably. His father commended him kindly, then said, "I am going in to the city directly after we have had breakfast and family worship, and shall take you with me if you would like to go."
"Thank you, sir; indeed I would!" returned Max, his eyes shining, for he esteemed it one of his greatest pleasures and privileges to be permitted to go anywhere with his father.
"Yes, I think you will enjoy it," the Captain said, smiling to see how pleased the boy was; "I have an errand which I shall tell to no one but Cousin Donald and you. See here," pointing to an advertisement in the paper he had been reading.
"A yacht for sale!" exclaimed Max; "Oh, Papa, are you going to buy it?"
"That is a question I am not prepared to answer till I have seen it, my boy," replied his father. "I shall take you and Cousin Donald, if he will go, to look at it and help me to decide whether to buy it or not."
Mr. Keith joined them at that moment, and was greeted with a pleasant good-morning and shown the advertisement, the Captain telling him that if the yacht proved such as he would like to own, he meant to buy it, and if the plan was agreeable to his wife, to spend the rest of the summer on board, taking his family and friends with him, making short voyages along the coast and perhaps some distance out to sea.