"Sure enough, doctor, mebbe you never would," said the captain. "And I suppose the innercent satisfaction you've got a-makin' them medicines is as great as you could 'a' got out of riches, and without the worry and care of riches, too."
"Not to mention the good done to my fellow-creturs," said the little doctor.
"Jest as you say, the good done to your fellow-creturs not bein' worth mentionin'" said Cap'n 'Kiah, with a grave simplicity that disarmed suspicion. "There ain't no denyin' that poverty is strength'nin' to the faculties."
"Don't give me nothin' more strength'nin than riches in mine," said Uncle Peter Henchman, who boasted great wisdom and experience, based mysteriously on the possession of a wooden leg. "I've been in this world up'ards of seventy years, forty-five of it a-walkin' on a wooden leg, and I hain't never seen that poverty was anything but a curse."
"You've got a terrible mistaken p'int of view, Peter, well-meanin' as you be," said Cap'n 'Kiah, "There's nothin' in nater, and, I was a-goin' to say, in grace, but what you clap your eyes fust onto the contr'y side, and then you're sure there ain't nothin' but a contr'y side."
"I wish I could see something besides the contr'y side of riches; but I hain't yet," said Miranda, with a heavy sigh.
Little Dr. Pingree cast a sidelong look at her, and then adjusted his cravat and considered the effect of the blue roses on his vest. Was a vision flitting before his eyes of the wagon drawn by gayly-caparisoned steeds and bearing in gilt letters on a red ground the legend, "Dr. Pingree's Pain-Exterminator, Humanity's Friend,"—of his own face, beautified by art, adorning fences and walls above this proud inscription, "The Renowned Inventor of the Universal Pain-Exterminator"? This fame, the dream of a lifetime, might now be purchased by money. And he had always admired Miranda.
Miranda caught his glance, and, with the suspicion which wealth had already engendered, divined his thought. Was there going to be another aspirant for her hand?
"The wind's a-blowin up; and what a roarin' the sea does make!" she said hurriedly, to cover her embarrassment. "The only thing I don't like about this house is its bein' so near the sea. It's rainin' hard; and I'm glad of it," she added, in an undertone, to Mrs. Bemis,—"for he won't be so likely to get round here to-night. Courtin' is real tryin'."
"The ocean is a dretful disconserlate-soundin' cretur," remarked Uncle Peter lugubriously; "and when you think of the drownded folks she's got a-rollin' round in her, 'tain't no wonder."