“_Your_ linen! Aha! How many smocks and petticoats will it make? Or is it for sheets and pillowbers? And must we all come and help you sew it, or is there time a plenty?” “Nay, Betty, there’s some one coming!” whispered Lora, as the figure of a tall young man of a decidedly clerical cut appeared from the front of the house, and Betty, all at once as demure as a kitten, seized one end of the linen, saying,-- “Certainly I’ll help you turn it, Bessie; and how is your mother to-night?” “Mother’s well, and-- Master Thacher, let me bring you acquainted with Mistress Alden and Mistress Standish, two of the chief of my friends.” “And so right welcome in mine eyes,” replied the young man heartily, as he lightly kissed the cheek of first one and then the other girl, a ceremony no more remarkable then than shaking hands is to-day. “My uncle Anthony has gone with Mr. Partridge to pay his respects to Captain Standish,” added he pleasantly. “All men delight to do honor to the Captain of Plymouth Colony.” “You are very courteous to say so, sir,” replied Lora, with her pretty little air of dignity and reserve; “and your uncle will be right welcome.” “’Tis strange we did not meet them in the way,” said Betty, whose brown eyes had not yet lost the gleam of merriment lighted by Bessie’s blushes. “Oh, they went by Master Alden’s to see him as well; and look, there they all are now,--the captain and father and Master Thacher!” cried Bessie. “They must have come to your house just as you left it, Lora.” “Nay, father was at work with Alick and Josias in the great field beside the road, and I doubt if the gentlemen went to the house at all,” said Lora, her face becoming radiant as her eyes met those of her father, now close at hand. Beside the captain strode the tall, gaunt figure of Ralph Partridge, a man whose many trials and persecutions had set their stamp upon a face naturally rugged, and bowed a form intended to be sturdy; at Standish’s other side walked a man younger in years than the dominie, but bearing upon his face much the same expression of strong endurance and unforgotten experiences,--a man with a story, as any one accustomed to reading faces would say, especially when, as now, the broad-leafed hat was removed, displaying the hair, thick as that of a youth, but white as that of a grandsire. “Here, Thomas!” cried this last comer, as the elders approached the little group of young people; “come hither, lad, and let me present you to the notice of Captain Myles Standish, whose name I have so often heard upon your lips.”