“Nay, husband, what think you?”
“I think,” he replied in an undertone, “that your sagacious teaching against idleness, and in favour of diligence and attention to duty, and so forth, has not taken very deep root yet.”
“And I think,” said Mrs Stanley, “that however wise you men may be in some things, you are all most incomprehensibly stupid in regard to the development of young minds.”
“Take care now, Jessie; you’re verging upon metaphysics. But you have only given me your opinion of men as yet; you have still to say what you think of Eda’s acknowledged predilection for idleness.”
“Well,” replied Mrs Stanley, “I think that my sagacious teaching, as you are pleased to call it, has taken pretty firm root already, and that Eda’s speech is one of the first bright, beautiful blossoms, from which we may look for much fruit hereafter; for to make one’s self and one’s fellow-creatures happy, because such is the will of God, seems to me a simple and comprehensive way of stating the whole duty of man.”
Stanley’s eyes opened a little at this definition. “Hum! multum in parvo; it may be so,” he said; and casting down his eyes, he was soon lost in a profound reverie, while the canoe continued to progress forward by little impulsive bounds, under the rapid stroke of the paddles. Eda rested her fair cheek on the shaggy brow of Chimo, and accompanied him to the land of nod, until the sun began to sink behind the icebergs on the seaward horizon, where a dark line indicated an approaching breeze.
Massan cast an uneasy glance at this from time to time. At length he called to his friend in the bow, “Hello, Prince! will it come stiff; think ye?”
“No,” replied Prince, rising and shading his eyes with his hand; “it’ll be only a puff; but that’s enough to drive the ice down on us, an’ shut up the open water.”
“It’s my ’pinion,” said Massan, “that we should hold away for the p’int yonder, an’ camp there.”
Dick Prince nodded assent, and resumed his paddle.