"And you are pleased to regard this cheapness as a virtue?" asked the Vice. "Is no one but the buyer to be considered?" How do you suppose people live who sell the products of their industry at such starvation figures? But monarchists and imperialists have but a single idea--to crush the poor." The Commodore shrunk an inch or two in length and breadth, but soon recovered himself, donned a vicious smile, and announced with assumed cheerfulness that the time had come to "sling the healthy," whereby monarchists, imperialists and republicans would suffer alike. "What's that?" asked the Cook. The Commodore grinned sardonically. "He wants to know what, slinging the healthy, is," said he. "Well, he'll know before dinner. It means paddling--paddling in earnest, young man--paddling a ten or fifteen mile stretch, instead of a leisurely half mile." There seemed no alternative, for the river was as smooth as glass. The sun noted the mirror-like surface of the water, and his natural vanity caused him to rub up his face until its brightness could not be increased. Just by way of refreshing the pleasurable sensation of beholding his face in the water, he dropped his gaze quite frequently upon the blue-shirted backs of the canoeists, until each man imagined that he must have caught some sparks from the camp-fire. Then it seemed as if there must be rain falling from the cloudless sky, for the Cook felt water-drops coursing steadily down his back. The Purser was sure his boat must be leaking, for water was gradually soaking the small canvas cushion on which he sat in the bottom of his canoe. The Vice's slippers grew clammily moist, and the Commodore's eyes filled with water which was not an accumulation of remorseful tears. But no man would debase himself so far as to be the first to cry for mercy. But the Vice, the Statesman, was true to his profession. To have suggested a rest would have been merely a straight-forward act which even an idiot might have performed. The Vice preferred to gain his point by an exercise of intellect. Half a mile down the stream was a small pier; to this the Vice called the panting Commodore's attention, and exclaimed, "That, by gosh,[6] is the identical dock where the Alderman and I went swimming. I assume that all such important precedents are to be respectfully observed?" "They _are_," said the Commodore, almost fainting with the ecstasy of the transition from despair to hope. Within ten minutes the boats were beached, and four perspiring canoeists, after an interval of rest, made haste to disrobe and take headers from the pier into the refreshing water. From this pier the Commodore called the attention of his companions to a glittering spire which shot heavenward a mile down the river, and exclaimed, "There begins Acadia. Every spire we see hereafter will be of that precise pattern--they are as unchanging as the beautiful faith which our sister Church of Rome maintains." [Illustration: The Dock.]