"Well, leaving out individuals, who certainly have been very kind to us," interposed Amy, "considering that in their hearts many of them think of us as 'those Yankees,' Wolfville has been fairly worth while." "Yes," replied Martine, "though I haven't been able to paint Blomidon, I have captured the Grand Pré willows. The subject may be trite, but I've managed to give it a touch of individuality by adding a tree or two and lopping off a branch or so, here and there, and this will set some persons guessing as to what my view is." "Oh, Martine!" "But the artistic reputation of the party is kept up by your mother's sketches. That one of the marshes is simply perfect. No one who had not seen the colors could believe that nature up here in the north is so brilliant. The water is so blue,--and she has caught it exactly,--and the bright red of the shore at low tide, and the vivid green of the dyke grass, varied here and there with clumps of yellow--" "Stop, stop; you make me fairly dizzy." "But it's a true picture, isn't it? and your mother has reproduced it to perfection, and if she doesn't sell it before Christmas I shall get papa to buy it for me." So the three friends sat and chatted on this their last afternoon in Evangeline's land, half regretting that the time was near when they must bid good-bye to Acadia. Though they had not tried to do all the things possible for the tourist, they had gone to the Look-off, the highest part of the Blomidon ridge, and from this spot had had a magnificent view of the Annapolis and Cornwallis valleys, and the six rivers flowing into Minas, and the hundreds of fertile farms and the picturesque seaports lying almost at their feet; and they had made also several side trips. Priscilla had slaked her thirst for information by setting down in her note-books many facts about the productiveness of the region, and declared that in future if she should meet a boy anxious to become a farmer she would send him to Nova Scotia rather than to the unknown West. "Ah, but there's no government land for him to take up here, and farms don't go for a song. Every inch is cultivated," rejoined Amy. Thus at last, when Amy with her mother and her friends were ready to leave Wolfville and Grand Pré and their neighborhood, their minds were filled not only with the history of Acadia and the memories of the past, but with pictures of the present that seemed likely to be lasting. Mrs. Redmond, moreover, in balancing her accounts,--not a reckoning of money, but of something more precious--counted as the greatest gain the improvement in health made by Priscilla and the improvement in disposition made by Martine.